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Property ladder: revisiting Norah Lofts' Suffolk House « Les Minimes

It’s said you should never go back, never return to old haunts. In general I find that sound advice. But sometimes, just sometimes, it doesn’t apply. All the same, when I once again encountered Norah Lofts’ superb Suffolk House trilogy leading us from the late 14th century to the 1950s by tracking those who develop, inhabit and are connected with a single dwelling – the House at Old Vine – I hesitated. I’d loved the books so much when I’d read them as a green girl; wouldn’t I risk spoiling memories, courting disillusionment by having another look through eyes more clear-sighted but far more jaded? © M Bannister 2009-2011 all rights reserved.

The short answer,  happily, is ‘no’. I was enthralled throughout, being unable to stop until I’d gone from The Town House

The writing is deft, driving the narrative forward in sure style. The principal focus is upon character – even subsidiary characters have utterly distinctive voices and very often contribute significantly to the plots: everybody is inter-connected. The books consist of a succession of linked short stories, and this structure allows the voices to be heard, each moving forward in time, as each new chapter in the house’s history enters a different period. These characters’ lives never progress smoothly, with corruption and graft in public life, betrayals and lies in private, and suffering evoked starkly rather than glossed over. Throughout there is a firm recognition of the fact that people do not always get their just desserts, and that luck or chance may intervene or not – nothing, and nobody, being entirely predictable. In The Town House , after savage fate has snatched away all that he values, we see Martin reflecting bitterly: ‘He might have known. It was all part of his life’s pattern; every small mitigation of misery had been immediately followed by some new misfortune.’ At that moment his is the authentic voice of despair, and understandably so. Yet, due to a series of opportunities and decisions that turn out better than expected, Martin builds the eponymous house and goes on to become a successful and moderately rich man – albeit one indelibly marked by his tragic losses (I suspect Norah Lofts would have given the so-called power of positive thought short shrift – yet another mark in her favour, if I’m right).© M Bannister 2009-2011 all rights reserved.