Judgement Day

Description

Clare Paling - clever, inquisitive, sceptical - has had to move to the drowsy village of Laddenham because of her highly successful husband's job. She is well-educated, attractive, has a nice house and wonderful children, but finds it hard to fit into the small, closed community, with its interesting sideshows of adultery, gossip and carefully adhered-to pecking orders.It takes her involvement in the church's fourth-centenary pageant and an unpardonable death to remind Clare, who had almost forgotten, that however hard you try to make sense of it, the world is a very uncertain place.

Penelope Lively is the author of many prize-winning novels and short-story collections for both adults and children. She has twice been shortlisted for the Booker Prize- once in 1977 for her first novel, The Road to Lichfield, and again in 1984 for According to Mark. She later won the 1987 Booker Prize for her highly acclaimed novel Moon Tiger. Her other books include Going Back; Judgement Day; Next to Nature, Art; Perfect Happiness; Passing On; City of the Mind; Cleopatra's Sister; Heat Wave; Beyond the Blue Mountains, a collection of short stories; Oleander, Jacaranda, a memoir of her childhood days in Egypt; Spiderweb; her autobiographical work, A House Unlocked; The Photograph; Making It Up; Consequences; Family Album, which was shortlisted for the 2009 Costa Novel Award, and How It All Began. She is a popular writer for children and has won both the Carnegie Medal and the Whitbread Award. She was appointed CBE in the 2001 New Year's Honours List, and DBE in 2012. Penelope Lively lives in London.