Imprint
- Virago
- Virago
Virago Modern Classics, Fiction, Modern & contemporary fiction (post c 1945), Classic fiction (pre c 1945), Romance
A surprising and dark novel of female passion from one of Ireland's best-loved novelists
Jessica and Jane have been living together for six months and are devoted friends - or are they Jessica loves her friend with the cruelty of total possessiveness; Jane is rich, silly, and drinks rather too many brandy-and-sodas.
Watching from the sidelines, their friend Sylvester regrets that Jane should be 'loved and bullied and perhaps even murdered by that frightful Jessica', but decides it's none of his business. When the Irish gentleman George Playfair meets Jane, however, he thinks otherwise and entices her to Ireland where the battle for her devotion begins.
Praise for Devoted Ladies
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Keane has a sharp eye, but a compassionate one - GUARDIAN
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Her books are witty, sardonic, human comedies, edged by black humour, and, like all good comedies, sadness and pathos lie close to the glittering surface - POLLY DEVLIN
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Miss Farrell's genius lies in her remorselessness ... deliciously funny - NEW YORK TIMES BOOK REVIEW
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The very best of AngloIrish writing - CLARE BOYLAN
-
Keane has a sharp eye, but a compassionate one - GUARDIAN
-
Her books are witty, sardonic, human comedies, edged by black humour, and, like all good comedies, sadness and pathos lie close to the glittering surface - POLLY DEVLIN
-
Miss Farrell's genius lies in her remorselessness ... deliciously funny - NEW YORK TIMES BOOK REVIEW
-
The very best of AngloIrish writing - CLARE BOYLAN
Molly Keane
Molly Keane (1904-1996) was an Irish novelist and playwright. She grew up at Ballyrankin in County Wexford and was educated at a boarding school in Bray, County Wicklow. She married Bobby Keane, one of a Waterford squirearchical family in 1938 and had two daughters.
She used her married name for her later novels, several of which (Good Behaviour, Time After Time) have been adapted for television. Between 1928 and 1956, she wrote eleven novels, and some of her earlier plays, under the pseudonym M. J. Farrell. Her husband died suddenly in 1946, and following the failure of a play she published nothing for twenty years. In 1981, Good Behaviour came out under her own name. The novel was warmly received and was shortlisted for the Man Booker Prize.
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