Saturday, November 09, 2019

The best books about nannies

Amanda Craig is a British novelist, short-story writer and critic. Her novels include Hearts And Minds and The Lie Of the Land. She is currently working on her eighth novel, which is inspired by the fairy-tale of "Beauty and the Beast."

At the Guardian, Craig tagged some of the best books about nannies, including:
For most readers, nannies remain unusual or uncommon – proof of a family’s privilege. However, this year has seen three notable adult novels with nannies at their centre. Jill Dawson’s captivatingly lyrical The Language of Birds explores the life of “Mandy River”, based on the one murdered by Lord Lucan, and for once puts the nanny centre stage as a person in her own right. Madeline Stevens’s slow-burning thriller Devotion dramatises the resentment that a poor young woman might feel when working in the home of a rich New York couple, and the unhealthy friendship that develops between her and the children’s mother. Ruth Ware’s The Turn of the Key is a wonderfully suspenseful riff on Henry James’s classic The Turn of the Screw, set in the Scottish Highlands and with toxic children at its heart. Nana the dog has never seemed more left behind.
Read about another entry on the list.

My Book, The Movie: Devotion.

The Page 69 Test: Devotion.

--Marshal Zeringue