Author(s): Janet Frame

Fiction

'Sometimes, Grace thought, 'no thank you' was the most chilling phrase in the English language.' Janet Frame wrote this small and exquisite novel in 1963 whilst taking a break from her longest novel, THE ADAPTABLE MAN. It's a highly personal work that she did not want published until after her death. TOWARDS ANOTHER SUMMER is a meditation on the themes of exile and return, homesickness and not remembering where home is. The novel is suffused with beauty and tenderness and shot-through with self-deprecating humour and knowingness, and frailty. All of Frame's observational prowess is here in the vivid, heartbreaking passages about children and childhood and in Grace, the protagonist's, growing awareness of the deep-rooted forces of social convention and how demanding and exhausting it can be to try and fulfil the expectations of others. Grace is taking a break from writing a long novel and seems to be losing her grip on daily life in London. She feels more and more like a migratory bird as the pull of her native New Zealand makes life in England seem transitory. The desire to allow herself to become a bird and leave behind the social human agonies of appearing neither too clever nor too stupid, too helpful or too lazy, becomes overwhelming. A beautiful novel that demands reading, and re-reading.