Lolly Willowes by Sylvia Townsend Warner was such a cozy and truly delightful read. Crafted in three parts we get to know Laura, Lolly, in the wake of the death of her parents. She’s 28 at the start of the novel, unmarried, and not looking to be. She was extremely close with her father, who was the most recent to die, and her grief absolutely overtakes her. Her older brother and his wife decided they need to take care of her. They want to move her out of their country home, and then to London, which they think will be good for her grief. In doing so they end up (in my opinion) taking advantage of her agreeable state. She spends a lot of time with her nieces and nephews and ends up devoting 20 years in that service.

The first part really covers all of that. And we get a good sense of who her family is and what the Willowes are like. We don’t get hung up in the minutia of the day to day, but you see a lot of love between the family members and also a real disconnect between them. The lines of love and pity are constantly crossed and the family members are very different in terms of what they’re looking for in life or even in their religious and familial directives.

The second part focuses a lot more on Lolly’s coming of age after the 20 year period. She starts to realize how unfulfilled she is. She’s 47 years old and she’s figuring out who she is. It’s kind of an awakening.

The third part deals with the main excitement of the book of which I do not want to spoil, but I would say it escalated quickly and it gets fun and interesting as she continues to come into her own. This is absolutely charming and while the pacing was not always my favorite (and I wanted more of a certain sections than I got) ultimately it felt really special and I’m so glad that I finally read it.

There were really poignant messages of moving on from the wrongs people have done you, and not having to do so through forgiveness. As well as messages of not being good at things even though you want to be, and even though you feel called to a way of life. Lolly is, in so many ways, working against herself constantly… but that’s okay, and that’s realistic.

I would recommend this pretty much to anybody who’s looking for something cozy, with low stakes and enjoyable writing. I did pick this up thinking it was going to be very autumnal and it’s really not. But it didn’t bother me too much. A great feminist classic, though, and we’ll worth ( )

Laura (Lolly) Willowes is an aging spinster, having spent her life first caring for her father and then for her brother’s children. After the ravages of World War I, she sees herself fair on the way to soon looking after her brother’s grandchildren, and she decides that it’s time she did some living for herself. She therefore takes what money she has left (after her brother invested it unwisely, without consulting her) and moves to a remote village, where she soon finds her true self - a witch. But her family isn’t done with her, and when her nephew comes to the village and looks to be taking over her life once again, she calls upon Satan for help…. This short novel from 1926 passed me by for many years; as a good feminist, I knew the name of the author but wasn’t familiar with her work. This is the kind of book that I find I need to be in the mood to enter, otherwise it just seems both bland and overworked in the fashion of the times in which it was written. But if one *does* get into the proper mood for it, it’s a terrific indictment of the place of women, especially surplus women, in late Victorian Britain going through into the post-WWI age and before the Depression. Whether Lolly really is a witch, whether she summons Satan and has long conversations with him, whether what befalls her nephew is planned or accidental, none of this matters; what matters is that Lolly finally can live her own life on her own terms. Recommended. ( )

Wonderful writing and a great 1926 feminist take on witches, the devil, a woman's life of drudgery and obscurity—not outdated in the least, unfortunately, but we're fortunate to have this fabulous novel. ( )

That was one weird novel. It did not start weird though - the first 2/3rds of the novel are a novel about the fate of single women of a certain class at the start of the 20th century. Then the last third comes and ejects all of that out of the window and leaves you wondering if that was meant to be a supernatural tale or a psychological one or if someone somewhere got a bit crazy (the reader? the writer? both?)

Laura Willowes is a dutiful daughter and sister who lives in the countryside with her father and keeps house for him. She is quite happy with her life and independence. Until her father dies and her brothers cannot imagine her living on her own (it is 1902 after all) and she is forced to move to London to play the unwed aunt to her nephews and help run the house of her brother.

If the novel had ended here it would have been a nice albeit short story of the times. But Sylvia Townsend Warner is not satisfied with her heroine loss of self control so Lolly (as everyone calls Laura) starts getting eccentric (isn't that a marvelous word to use when describing someone who is not conforming to the expectations). Everyone is patient with her for awhile - until she meets someone (no, not that way) and decides that her life is her own and she is moving to the countryside - to a new place noone had ever heard of.

And that's where the novel gets a bit... crazy. One way to read it is that the man who helped her throw away the expectations was the Devil. The other way is that our Lolly got a bit touched in the head. Which I usually do not mind in novels but... this one is considered a feminist icon and it just looks a bit weird that the only way for a woman to get free and clear from expectation is either via a deal with the devil or by getting crazy. On the other hand, considering when the novel was set, that may have been really the only possible way for the story to work. If anything, I am surprised her brothers did not try to commit her into a hospital.

So did I like the novel as a whole? I am still not sure. I liked the language and I liked Lolly but the whole thing sounded like a bit of a cheap trick. Of course, I also live almost a century after the book was published and even longer since the time of the action and that is one period I had not read much from. From the little I had read though, that may have been the only way to get a book about a spinster who decides not to do what is expected to be published. And it made me want to read more from the author so there is that. ( )

I appreciate the feminist POV in this book very much and have marked passages for re-reading and adoration. The themes, the settings, all wonderful and detailed. Oh, and little Vinegar! However, it took me a long time to get through this little volume, and I struggled with keeping my focus increasingly as the book went on. I look forward to reading more by STW, perhaps after I clear my head with some books that won't let me be distracted. ( )