Stylised headshot of Anna Glendenning superimposed into the collage-style jacket of An Experiment in Leisure

VINTAGE_EILAUTHOR_PICS1800X1200.jpg

Features

Writing queer joy

Anna Glendenning

Riveting...the words blaze and bounce across the page

Claire-Louise Bennett, author of Checkout 19

I adore this book... Shows us the burning, intense, messy beauty of youth

A stunning, vivid and very funny debut

This is such a special book. With deeply joyful pace, and rhythm, I grew as obsessed with the prose itself as I did with the plot and characters. As things in the Big World seem to get more binary, An Experiment in Leisure plunders the grey area with wit and forgiveness - and that's exactly where I wanted to be

Tom Rasmussen, author of First Comes Love

Remarkably assured... An attractive aspect of Glendenning's writing is the warmth with which she suffuses not just Grace but her whole cast of characters

An Experiment in Leisure is an absolutely riveting novel that is both full of life and full of loneliness. Glendenning's words blaze and bounce across the page, brilliantly evoking the bizarre paradox that dogs early adulthood - namely, feeling intensely self-conscious despite possessing only the merest most nascent sense of having a self. A dizzying yet powerful read

I adore this book! It's a short, sharp shot of oxygen straight to the soul. An exquisite mix of agonising pain and unbridled joy. An Experiment in Leisure shows us the burning, intense, messy beauty of youth and what it means to be alive

A stunning, vivid and very funny debut about loss, family and the search for self-knowledge and a meaningful life. It's about the language of the heart, and how encountering those who speak a common tongue can shape the course of a life

A deft exploration of millennial angst

'I adore this book! ... An Experiment in Leisure shows us the burning, intense, messy beauty of youth and what it means to be alive' Maxine Peake 
 
 'Can I get a refund?' I asked the bus driver. 
 'You taking the piss, love?' 
 
 It's the eve of Brexit, and Grace is supposed to have what she wants. She's swapped West Yorkshire for north London, her accent carefully edited. Her friends drink beer out of artful tins. She makes flat whites for people with berets. She's found a psychoanalyst. 
 
 But this fantasy of metropolitan cool is turning out to be more costly than she thought and Grace faces complicated crises of identity, class, sexuality and geography. 
 
Can she remember how to love? Can she find a way home? 
 
 'A dizzying yet powerful read' Claire-Louise Bennett, author of Checkout 19

An Experiment in Leisure

About us

About Us (Header 4)

Best-Jane-Austen-quotes_Online-Desktop_Penguin

James-Baldwin

Marian-Keyes

haruki-murakami-320×320-1

Richard-Osman

Malorie Blackman

Lisa-Jewell

Charlie-Mackesy

Authors (Header 3)

Children&#039;s

Company

Discover

Fiction

Non-fiction

Penguin Classics

Penguin Shop (Header 5)

Useful links

Work with us

sectionTitle

isEnabled

anchor

anchorLabel

prhuk/featured-book

prhuk/praise-section

maxBooks

showViewMore

prhuk/books-section

hideAuthorAlert

formName

iterableDivision

iterableBrand

buttonText

description

heading

legalText

successHeading

successText

image

alignment

variation

prhuk/email-section

prhuk/series-section

prhuk/biography-section

prhuk/articles-section

prhuk-authors

Wings

Classic Football Shirts

Frankenstein

Anna Glendenning

Praise for An Experiment in Leisure

Riveting...the words blaze and bounce across the page

I adore this book... Shows us the burning, intense, messy beauty of youth

A stunning, vivid and very funny debut

Riveting...the words blaze and bounce across the page

I adore this book... Shows us the burning, intense, messy beauty of youth

A stunning, vivid and very funny debut

Riveting...the words blaze and bounce across the page

I adore this book... Shows us the burning, intense, messy beauty of youth

A stunning, vivid and very funny debut

Articles featuring Anna Glendenning

Writing queer joy

Follow penguin

Follow ladybird

Follow puffin

Sign up to the Penguin newsletter