A review by bookeboy
The Golden Child by Penelope Fitzgerald

3.0

The Golden Child was Booker winner Penelope Fitzgerald's first novel, written in her late fifties to entertain her dying husband. So the story goes. It is a comedy according to the praise on the cover, but don't come looking for laughs. I found it rather tedious and only finished it due to some strange unexplainable desire for closure. Something in the way it was written reminded me of Russell Hoban's Kleinzeit, but sadly not enough to lift it out of the doldrums. First novels often give away secrets authors later learn to hide. But not this one. It was tight lipped. I liked The Bookshop and will read more from Penelope Fitzgerald. I definitely like the sound of Offshore but this one wasn't for me.