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  • Published: 15 May 2013
  • ISBN: 9780099566021
  • Imprint: Vintage
  • Format: Paperback
  • Pages: 304
  • RRP: $27.99

By Battersea Bridge




A startlingly beautiful novel about the complications of family relationships by highly acclaimed novelist Janet Davey

Anita Mostyn feels the need to take a holiday from her life. As a child, she was dismissed by her parents in favour of her more confident brothers, and as an adult, her choices are disapproved of – the small art gallery she works for, the friends she makes, the men she sees. On a whim, she takes up an offer to scout for holiday properties in Bulgaria, escaping the impending second wedding of her perfect brother. But as Anita navigates these difficult waters, a horrifying episode in her past – the thing she has really been trying to escape – comes back to haunt her.

  • Published: 15 May 2013
  • ISBN: 9780099566021
  • Imprint: Vintage
  • Format: Paperback
  • Pages: 304
  • RRP: $27.99

About the author

Janet Davey

Janet Davey was born in 1953. She is the author of English Correspondence, which was longlisted for the Orange Prize for Fiction, First Aid, The Taxi Queue and By Battersea Bridge.

Also by Janet Davey

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Praise for By Battersea Bridge

Anita is an immediately recognisable psychological type, the product of a pressurized upbringing… This personality type is realistically portrayed as every detail in the novel, down to the smell of boiling turkey stock in her ageing parents’ Hampshire home.

Ophelia Field, Observer

Stylish and mesmerising.

Sainsbury's Magazine

Funny and real as well as impressively sympathetic...this perceptive, engaging little novel says a great deal about human vulnerability, resilience and the passivity that too often goes unnoticed.

Eileen Battersby, Irish Times

A triumph

Susie Boyt, Independent

The book is studded with gem-like observations of this privileged English family, whose preoccupations are 'schooling, property and the form of things'. Davey brilliantly observes the mix of obstinacy and pride - the fortitude - required to survive such a heritage. By Battersea Bridge is itself a kind of verbal still life, with exquisite and revelatory strokes wherever you look

Jon Canter, Lady

We're lucky to have such an intelligent chronicler of our present - and of the dirty, noisy beauty of contemporary London

Tessa Hadley, Guardian

Easy to read and oddly compelling...a memorable, and very clever, book

Lucy Atkins, Sunday Times

So deliciously written that it's worth re-reading to savour the images she conjures up...it's a joy to read

Clare Colvin, Daily Mail

The glinting briskness of Davey's prose, the acuteness of her observations and the crispness of her wit keep the pages swiftly turning

Stephanie Cross, TLS

Davey is a subtle and delicate writer, and this is an excellent study of modern alienation

William Leith, Evening Standard

A subtle and beautifully written book that succeeds at the difficult task of capturing how real life actually feels

Emma Hagestadt, Independent
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