Lady Living Alone by Norah Lofts

Norah Lofts’s Lady Living Alone is such an unexpected novel! Originally published in 1945, this is the latest book British Library Publishing has released in their Women Writers series. It features a gorgeous autumnal cover designed by Sinem Erkas, who is responsible for all of the cover art in this fabulous series. I do believe these books just keep getting more beautiful with each new cover that comes out.

First of all, I highly recommend going into this one completely blind. That means resisting the urge to read the back cover copy and skipping this review. But while I still have your attention, I do very much recommend this book if you like less cosy literary fiction that keeps you in anticipation. It was so good, I read it in a single day!

(Only keep reading beyond this point if you have decided you are happy with a few spoilers. Not to worry. There will not be many.) 

I should clarify why I suggest going into this one blind. Some of you may already know this about me, but I typically refrain from reading book blurbs because I like to approach new books with minimal expectation. I accidentally read the start of the blurb for this book in a caption on Instagram and I wish I hadn’t read this line, “what begins as a domestic novel quickly evolves into a dramatic thriller”. In the case of this book, I think the reading experience would be improved upon if one approached it without that knowledge. 

However, I can understand why the publisher chose to provide that information in the blurb. Not everyone likes a thriller, and providing the reader with that information ahead of time gives them enough outside knowledge to not feel bamboozled when the cosy domestic novel this book begins as gets turned on its head. By its genre alone, this one stands out among the other books in the Women Writers series that I have read. I’ve only read 15 of the 26 titles released thus far, so there may be other thriller-y books in this series, but if there are I have yet to come across them. I’m inclined to believe that Lady Living Alone would be equally at home in the British Library Crime Classics series. Although, of course that would really give the genre away!

Penelope Shadow lives with her half-sister, Elsie, until Elsie remarries, and Penelope settles in a remote house in the country. It might be a bit big for a single lady living alone in 1932, but with the success of her romance novels there is no need to let that stop her from moving into a lovely Georgian home with formal gardens, a view of water meadows, and backing onto a park.

“It’ll be awfully lonely," said Elsie in as diffident a way as her forthright voice could speak. She was remembering that over a period of twelve years Penelope's little foible of not liking to be alone in a house after dark, had caused her hostess a vast amount of inconvenience.

Miss Shadow's heart had missed a beat or two as she too, and for the first time, remembered her abnormal nervousness. (18)

In my opinion it is here that we get the first major clue that this story is going to be anything but cosy. Penelope’s fear of being alone in a house after dark is both described as being a “little foible” and an “abnormal nervousness”, as though we are being told it’s an unimportant detail no need to worry yourself with it—but it’s also not a normal thing.

It’s because of this fear that in the first week of January 1935 we find 35-year-old Penelope “driving through the premature dusk of a snow-storm, to all intents and purposes, homeless” (19). It is this running away from an uncertain fear, that puts her on the path to a much more certain one.

Afterwards, through vastly varying moods, her fancy would play with the idea that Fate had been with her on that afternoon, guiding her actions, moulding her very thoughts. And, oddly enough, though everything within sight was by this time thickly coated with snow which was falling so fast that Miss Shadow had twice had to clear the accumulation of it from her windscreen where the wiper was clogging, the momentous notice-board, with its back to the wind, was clear and perfectly legible. From a great way off Miss Shadow read its exhortation. "Turn Left," it said, "for the Plantation Guest House. Historic Surroundings with Modern Comforts. Golf. Riding. Fishing, H. and C. in all rooms. Terms Moderate."

Made for me, said Miss Shadow aloud. She had contracted the habit of talking to herself when alone. (28-29)

It’s here, in this country house turned dismal guest house, that Penelope meets Terence Munce, a young man who works as a waiter/housekeeper/cook at the establishment. He is the one dependable staff member in the dire place, and Penelope immediately takes a liking to him. The next day she heads for home, but before she goes she overhears Terry in the act of quitting and after offering him a lift, she impulsively offers him a job as her housekeeper.

There is a great scene that occurs after Terry has established himself as someone who is both kind and a valuable asset to Penelope. Terry has gone out for the evening and Penelope has just risen from her desk after finishing the novel she has been working on. It’s nine o’clock and the shadows are lengthening, but the trees are still bathed in golden light as she goes out into the garden. She settles herself down and caught in thought she loses track of time. 

The shadows deepened. The last bird calls began to die away. A little breeze sprang up, ruffling and cooling the earth without chilling or disarranging it. Penelope looked at her watch. It was just on ten o’clock. Nearly dark. She must go into the house. She half rose from the seat and then sat back again. She had left it too late. The house had changed from a possession, a happy place where one lived and ate and slept and had become a menacing, dark hulk, the abode of darkness and mystery, an alien territory not to be approached without the help of a friendly human presence, or a bright and friendly light. (81)

As I was reading, this book reminded me of a particular Hitchcock film. I’d love to share which one with you, but I worry that to do so would spoil some of the tension for those who haven’t yet read the book. 

There are so many things I loved about Lady Living Alone. The build up of tension throughout is incredibly well done. I read this book in a single day because I could not help but! It’s completely unpredictable. You think there is going to be a certain outcome and Norah Lofts continues to subvert the reader’s expectations. And Penelope Shadow! Beyond giving her a brilliant name, Lofts has created a complex character that manages to be both likeable and frustrating often at the same time. Penelope is a success in her profession, and but for her one weakness—this fear of being alone in a house at night—she has an inner strength that is eventually allows her to come out of the shadows. (Couldn’t help myself.)

There are a lot of things I could say about this novel, but the most important one is that I think you should read it. Oh, and then go ahead and read Simon Thomas’s afterword. He writes such good ones!

Thank you to British Library Publishing for kindly sending me a copy of Lady Living Alone for review. As always, all opinions on the book are my own.