Journal Entry 1 by lellie from Trimley St Mary, Suffolk United Kingdom on Tuesday, January 04, 2005

Zelda Dawkins’ life has changed a lot in one evening. Soaking in her bath, she doesn’t know whether to feel more distressed by the news of her father’s suicide or by her suspicions that her lover, Foxy, is sleeping with another women.

But unlike her affections for Foxy, Zelda’s feelings towards her father, a former Japanese POW, are confused. Forced by his death to re-examine their relationship, she recalls a childhood haunted by his night-time screaming fits and troubled by his chilly silences. But what she remembers most is his curious and intense attachment to the little boy next door. And when she discovers her father’s diary, the secrets she finds there only raise more disturbing questions about her family’s past.
 

Journal Entry 2 by lellie from Trimley St Mary, Suffolk United Kingdom on Tuesday, August 02, 2005

I read this on holiday in France and couldn't put it down.
I love Lesley Glaister's books, they are always a bit different.
I spotted it on goatgrrls wishlist so now it's on its way across the ocean. 

Journal Entry 3 by goatgrrl from New Westminster, British Columbia Canada on Tuesday, August 16, 2005

Thank you, thank you, redhouse - Easy Peasy arrived in yesterday's mail, and is now perched very close to the top of my TBR pile. I'm really looking forward to it! 

Journal Entry 4 by goatgrrl from New Westminster, British Columbia Canada on Sunday, April 15, 2007

Easy Peasy tells the story of twenty-nine year old Griselda "Zelda" Dawkins, who lives with her older lesbian lover Foxy in York, England. As the book begins, Zelda and Foxy have just received news that Zelda's father has died, a suicide. Zelda must travel to her parents' home for the funeral, leaving Foxy at home (Foxy offers to accompany her, but Zelda seems curiously unwilling to bring her friend home -- an old habit, it seems). The journey sends her into a series of flashbacks that dart in and out of the narrative (perhaps a stylistic nod in the direction of William Faulkner's oft-quoted observation that "the past is never dead ... it's not even past"), gradually filling in the story of who Zelda's father was, and what drove him to so desperate an act.

In fact, Easy Peasy is all about the past, right down to Zelda and Foxy's occupations (Foxy is a historian and Zelda runs a vintage clothing store called Second Hand Rose). Revisiting her father's life story through old letters forwarded by the widow of a wartime colleague, Zelda peels back the layers of her father's history in a Burmese POW camp, strongly suggesting a connection between Mr. Dawkins' wartime experience and his idiosyncracies as an older adult.

Easy Peasy was shortlisted for the Guardian Fiction Prize.

Other books by Lesley Glaister I've read and enjoyed include: Trick or Treat, Honour Thy Father, Sheer Blue Bliss and As Far As You Can Go. 

Journal Entry 5 by goatgrrl at Starbucks 6th and Columbia in New Westminster, British Columbia Canada on Tuesday, April 17, 2007

Released 4 yrs ago (4/17/2007 UTC) at Starbucks 6th and Columbia in New Westminster, British Columbia Canada

WILD RELEASE NOTES:

RELEASE NOTES:

I'll be leaving this book near the newspaper rack at Starbucks around 7 am today. Best wishes and happy reading to whomever picks it up.