'This delicious confection will work its magic on all' Daily Telegraph
The discreet advertisement in The Times, addressed 'To Those who Appreciate Wistaria and Sunshine', offers a small medieval castle for rent, above a bay on the Italian Riviera. Four very different women - the dishevelled and downtrodden Mrs Wilkins, the sad, sweet-faced Mrs Arbuthnot, the formidable widow Mrs Fisher and the ravishing socialite Lady Caroline Dester - are drawn to the shores of the Mediterranean that April. As each, in turn, blossoms in the warmth of the Italian spring and finds their spirits stirring, quite unexpected changes occur.
The Enchanted April, published in 1922, is a witty and delightful depiction of what it is like to rediscover joy.
'Brims with magic and laughter' Amanda Craig, Guardian
Includes a new introduction by Salley Vickers, author of Miss Garnet's Angel
Imprint: Penguin
Published: 05/04/2012
ISBN: 9780141932682
Length: 240 Pages
RRP: £8.99
The Enchanted April sounds as if it would be an appallingly cloying cream puff of a fairy tale, but that would be to ignore that the author habitually kept a pot of lemon juice mixed with vinegar beside her ink-pot
Extraordinarily well written...it is witty, human, often very beautiful
She has a wild sense of comedy and a vision - continually thwarted though it was - of potential happiness
Elizabeth von Arnim is a mistress of irony