Troy Chimneys

Description

A remarkable historical novel, set in Austen-era England, exploring issues of identity, love and class, from the author of The Constant Nymph A Victorian gentleman is forced by illness to entertain himself with the family archive, and he uncovers the Regency-era correspondence and diaries of one Miles Lufton, MP - apparently a black sheep of the family, connected with a scandal long buried. But through the pieced-together artefacts from the past, a fuller picture emerges of a man torn between two personalities - Miles, serious, studious and penniless, and 'Pronto', flirt, political mover and eternal 'extra man'. Miles longs to dispose of his disreputable alter ego, but that way lies calamity...

Margaret Kennedy was born in London on 23 April 1896, the eldest of four children. Her first book, a commissioned work of history, was published in 1922 and was soon followed by her first work of fiction, The Ladies of Lyndon (1923). Her second novel, The Constant Nymph (1924), became a worldwide bestseller, and with it Kennedy became a well-known and highly praised writer. Kennedy went on to write fifteen further novels, many of which were critically commended - Troy Chimneys (1953) was awarded the James Tait Black Memorial Prize. She also wrote plays, adapting both The Constant Nymph and its sequel The Fool of the Family very successfully. The former opened in the West End in 1926, starring Noel Coward followed by John Gielgud, to great acclaim. Three different film versions of The Constant Nymph, featuring stars of the time such as Ivor Novello and Joan Fontaine, were equally popular. She also published a study of Jane Austen (1950) and a work of literary criticism, The Outlaws on Parnassus, in 1958. Kennedy died 31 July 1967. Writer Beverley Nichols said of Kennedy- 'There is a wildness in her mind ; a galloping, untutored spirit'.

She combines imagination with delicate feeling, capturing the right atmosphere with a simple style that makes her story timeless * Times Literary Supplement * Margaret Kennedy caught just the taste of the time, mixing a stolid domestic Englishness with 'Continental' bohemians * Irish Times * She is not only a romantic but an anarchist, and she knows the ways of men and women very well indeed -- Anita Brookner Kennedy was immensely popular in her heyday * Washington Post *