Daughters
of jerusalem
Daughters of Jerusalem, Charlotte’s second novel, is set in North Oxford, where she grew up. Here, in the Lux family, trouble stirs. Eve, the elder daughter, is seething with loathing for her charismatic sister Phoebe; meanwhile, their mother's best friend, Helena, is about to make a startling confession.
This is Oxford, where cleverness is all, and secret love, and secret hatred, must be repressed. But repression never works for long.
She is sick of this – of Oxford’s sooty
castles…She is sick of navy-blue corduroy, Gothic arches,
famous fig trees, shabby dons’ wives, cellars, rivers, genius
children, stuttering and gold leaf. It is your fault, she
thinks, approaching her husband’s college, as she glimpses
her neighbour, an entirely silent botanist, attempting to
untangle his own beard from a hawthorn tree. None of you
are normal. Is normal. And I am.
Reviews
‘A superb, hilarious farce of dysfunctional academic
family life. Funny, exciting, lyrical, poignant, redemptive
- it was a privilege to review this book’
Guardian
‘Brilliant…exhilarating…Exciting and memorably
written, this is one of those rare reads that has you galloping
to the end, but feeling bereft at having to say goodbye so
soon’
Independent
‘Brilliant and witty…Mendelson’s second
bewitchingly erotic and darkly dramatic novel confirms her
as a stylish, perceptive chronicler of the heart’s hidden
desires’
Daily Mail
‘A witty and absorbing work of fiction…wonderful…surprising
and satisfying’
Times Literary Supplement
‘Brilliantly observed…acerbic
social comedy of the most unflinching, satisfying kind’
Sunday
Times
‘Miss Marple meets Rosamond Lehmann…luscious
prose and droll comedy… you feel that you should be
reading [it] on a chaise longue, stuffing yourself with violet
creams’
Observer
‘Charlotte Mendelson seems to bear a grudge against
the whole of Oxford. And I’m glad. Her tale…had
me guiltily neglecting both work and household responsibilities
for the day I was glued to it…Mendelson turns the pressure
up and up. This is funny, moving and gorgeously bitchy’
Telegraph |
Daughters of Jerusalem
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