Best Selling Books by Tessa Hadley

Clever Girl is an indelible story of one woman’s life, unfolded in a series of beautifully sculpted episodes that illuminate an era, moving from the 1960s to today, from one of Britain’s leading literary lights—Tessa Hadley—the author of the New York Times Notable Books Married Love and The London Train. Like Alice Munro and Colm Tóibin, Tessa Hadley brilliantly captures the beauty, innocence, and irony of ordinary lives—an ability to transform the mundane into the sublime that elevates domestic fiction to literary art. Written with the celebrated precision, intensity, and complexity that have marked her previous works, Clever Girl is a powerful exploration of family relationships and class in modern life, witnessed through the experiences of an English woman named Stella. Unfolding in a series of snapshots, Tessa Hadley’s moving novel follows Stella from the shallows of childhood, growing up with a single mother in a Bristol bedsit in the 1960s, into the murky waters of middle age. Clever Girl is a story vivid in its immediacy and rich in drama—violent deaths, failed affairs, broken dreams, missed chances. Yet it is Hadley’s observations of everyday life, her keen skill at capturing the ways men and women think and feel and relate to one another, that dazzles.

“Exquisite." —Minneapolis Star Tribune • "Brilliantly observed.” — People, Pick of the Week “A beguiling novel, deceptively easy to read; beneath the surface swim disturbing and age-old questions about freedom and fate.” — Hilary Mantel From the bestselling author of Late in the Day and The Past comes a compulsive new novel about one woman’s sexual and intellectual awakening in 1960s London. 1967. While London comes alive with the new youth revolution, the suburban Fischer family seems to belong to an older world of conventional stability: pretty, dutiful homemaker Phyllis is married to Roger, a devoted father with a career in the Foreign Office. Their children are Colette, a bookish teenager, and Hugh, the golden boy. But when the twenty-something son of an old friend pays the Fischers a visit one hot summer evening, and kisses Phyllis in the dark garden after dinner, something in her catches fire. Newly awake to the world, Phyllis makes a choice that defies all expectations of her as a wife and a mother. Nothing in these ordinary lives is so ordinary after all, it turns out, as the family’s upheaval mirrors the dramatic transformation of the society around them. With scalpel-sharp insight, Tessa Hadley explores her characters’ inner worlds, laying bare their fears and longings. Daring and sensual, Free Love is an irresistible exploration of romantic love, sexual freedom and living out the truest and most meaningful version of our selves – a novel that showcases Hadley’s unrivaled ability to “put on paper a consciousness so visceral, so fully realized, it heightens and expands your own” (Lily King, author of Euphoria).

Winner of the Edge Hill Short Story Prize A New York Times Notable Book of the Year An NPR Best Book of the Year The award-winning author of The Past once again "crystallizes the atmosphere of ordinary life in prose somehow miraculous and natural" (Washington Post), in a collection of stories that elevate the mundane into the exceptional. The author of six critically acclaimed novels, Tessa Hadley has proven herself to be the champion of revealing the hidden depths in the deceptively simple. In these short stories it’s the ordinary things that turn out to be most extraordinary: the history of a length of fabric or a forgotten jacket. Two sisters quarrel over an inheritance and a new baby; a child awake in the night explores the familiar rooms of her home, made strange by the darkness; a housekeeper caring for a helpless old man uncovers secrets from his past. The first steps into a turning point and a new life are made so easily and carelessly: each of these stories illuminate crucial moments of transition, often imperceptible to the protagonists. A girl accepts a lift in a car with some older boys; a young woman reads the diaries she discovers while housesitting. Small acts have large consequences, some that can reverberate across decades; private fantasies can affect other people, for better and worse. The real things that happen to people, the accidents that befall them, are every bit as mysterious as their longings and their dreams. Bad Dreams and Other Stories demonstrates yet again that Tessa Hadley "puts on paper a consciousness so visceral, so fully realized, it heightens and expands your own. She is a true master" (Lily King, author of Euphoria).

Sunday Times bestseller Tessa Hadley explores the big consequences of small events in this new collection ''You''ve either got it or you haven''t. Hadley''s got it'' FINANCIAL TIMES Heloise''s father died in a car crash when she was a little girl; at a dinner party in her forties, she meets someone connected to that long-ago tragedy. Janey''s bohemian mother plans to marry a man close to Janey''s own age - everything changes when an accident interrupts the wedding party. A daughter caring for her elderly mother during the pandemic becomes obsessed with the woman next door; in the wake of his best friend''s death, a man must reassess his affair with the friend''s wife. Teenager Cecilia wakes one morning on vacation with her parents in Florence and sees them for the first time through disenchanted eyes. These stories illuminate the enduring conflicts between responsibility and freedom, power and desire, convention and subversion, reality, and dreams. ***A GUARDIAN AND NEW STATESMAN BOOK OF THE YEAR 2023*** ***ONE OF THE BBC''S ''25 BEST BOOKS OF THE YEAR 2023''***

“With each new book by Tessa Hadley, I grow more convinced that she’s one of the greatest stylists alive.”—Ron Charles, Washington Post New York Times Book Review Editors'' Choice |A Parnassus First Editions Club Pick | Powell’s Indispensable Book Club Pick | A Washington Post Notable Book | A Slate Best Book of the Year | A Boston Globe Best Book of the Year | A Bookpage Best Book of the Year The lives of two close-knit couples are irrevocably changed by an untimely death in the latest from Tessa Hadley, the acclaimed novelist and short story master who “recruits admirers with each book” (Hilary Mantel). Alexandr and Christine and Zachary and Lydia have been friends since they first met in their twenties. Thirty years later, Alex and Christine are spending a leisurely summer’s evening at home when they receive a call from a distraught Lydia: she is at the hospital. Zach is dead. In the wake of this profound loss, the three friends find themselves unmoored; all agree that Zach, with his generous, grounded spirit, was the irreplaceable one they couldn’t afford to lose. Inconsolable, Lydia moves in with Alex and Christine. But instead of loss bringing them closer, the three of them find over the following months that it warps their relationships, as old entanglements and grievances rise from the past, and love and sorrow give way to anger and bitterness. Late in the Day explores the complex webs at the center of our most intimate relationships, to expose how, beneath the seemingly dependable arrangements we make for our lives, lie infinite alternate configurations. Ingeniously moving between past and present and through the intricacies of her characters’ thoughts and interactions, Tessa Hadley once again “crystallizes the atmosphere of ordinary life in prose somehow miraculous and natural” (Washington Post).

Twenty-nine-year-old suburban mother of three, Clare Menges'' comfortable world is disrupted when her best friend''s lover appears in her life. Hadley constructs a beautifully fashioned and intimate portrait of family life in our times.

A masterful collection of stories that plumb the depths of everyday life to reveal the shifting tides and hidden undercurrents of ordinary relationships—Tessa Hadley is "one of the greatest stylists alive" (Ron Charles, Washington Post). A Best Book of the Year: TIME, The New Yorker, The Washington Post, Vogue “Hadley is pure magic and After the Funeral is a triumph.”—Lily King, New York Times best-selling author of Writers & Lovers and Euphoria In each of these twelve stories, small events have huge consequences. Heloise’s father died in a car crash when she was a little girl; at a dinner party in her forties, she meets someone connected to that long-ago tragedy. Two estranged sisters cross paths at a posh hotel and pretend not to recognize each other. Janie’s bohemian mother plans to marry a man close to Janie’s own age—everything changes when an accident interrupts the wedding party. A daughter caring for her elderly mother during the pandemic becomes obsessed with the woman next door; in the wake of his best friend’s death, a man must reassess his affair with the friend’s wife. Cecilia, a teenager, wakes one morning in Florence on vacation with her parents and sees them for the first time through disenchanted eyes. As psychologically astute as they are emotionally rich, these stories illuminate the enduring conflicts between responsibility and freedom, power and desire, convention and subversion, reality and dreams. A vital addition to Tessa Hadley’s celebrated body of work, After the Funeral and Other Stories showcases what Colm Tóibín describes as "Tessa Hadley''s extraordinary skill at making both surface life and deep interiors come fully alive."

A single woman at loose ends becomes the object of two men''s affections—a father and his teenage son—in this sly, richly drawn novel, The Master Bedroom After more than twenty years in London, Kate Flynn has returned to her family home in Wales to care for her aging mother. Having cast off her academic career, she is unmoored, and when she runs into a childhood friend, David Roberts, at a concert, she finds herself falling for him, although she knows she''s grasping at anything to fill the sudden emptiness of her life. For his part, David''s marriage isn''t as solid as it looks—his wife, Suzie, has begun acting strangely, moving out of their bedroom, neglecting their children, and disappearing for days at a time—and he begins to seek refuge with Kate from the newfound chaos of his life. David''s seventeen-year-old son, Jamie, is also drawn to Kate''s eccentricity and her strange, glamorous old house full of books and music and history. As both father and son set about their parallel courtships, Tessa Hadley''s intricate, graceful novel explores the tangled web of connections between parents and children, revealing how each generation replays the stories of the one that came before, in new and sometimes startling patterns.

The “supremely perceptive writer of formidable skill and intelligence (New York Times Book Review) turns her astute eye to a dramatic family reunion, where simmering tensions and secrets come to a head over three long, hot summer weeks. “A novel so evocative of summer and adolescence that to read it is to reexperience the deep languor and longing of those days.” — Tayari Jones, O Magazine “Exquisite. . . . For anyone who cherishes Anne Tyler and Alice Munro, the book offers similar deep pleasures.” — Ron Charles, Washington Post Winner of the Windham Campbell Prize • A Washington Post Best Book of the Year • A Time Best Book of the Year • A San Francisco Chronicle Top 10 Book of the Year • A Huffington Post Best Fiction Book of the Year • A New York Times Editors’ Choice Three sisters and a brother, complete with children, a new wife, and an ex-boyfriend’s son, descend on their grandparents’ dilapidated old home in the Somerset countryside for a final summer holiday. The house is full of memories of their childhood and their past—their mother took them there to live when she left their father—but now, they may have to sell it. And beneath the idyllic pastoral surface lie tensions. As the family’s stories and silences intertwine over the course of three long, hot weeks, small disturbances build into familial crises, and a way of life—bourgeois, literate, ritualized, Anglican—winds down to its inevitable end.

“Filled with exquisitely calibrated gradations and expressions of class, conducted with symphonic intensity and complexity. . . . Extraordinarily well-made.” —New York Times Book Review Married Love is a masterful collection of short fiction from one of today’s most accomplished storytellers. These tales showcase the qualities for which Tessa Hadley has long been praised: her humor, warmth, and psychological acuity; her powerful, precise, and emotionally dense prose; her unflinching examinations of family relationships. Here are stories that range widely across generations and classes, exploring the private and public lives of unforgettable characters: a young girl who haunts the edges of her parents’ party; a wife released by the sudden death of her film-director husband; an eighteen-year-old who insists on marrying her music professor, only to find herself shut out from his secrets. Hadley evokes worlds that expand in the imagination far beyond the pages, capturing domestic dramas, generational sagas, wrenching love affairs and epiphanies, and distilling them to remarkable effect. “Hadley parses the meaning of love in all its paradoxical, panoramic glory.” —Booklist “These stories are gemlike and unforgettable.” —Kate Tuttle, Boston Globe “One of the most interesting writers around.” —Philip Womack, The Spectator “Only Alice Munro and Colm Tóibin . . . are so adept at portraying whole lives in a few thousand words. . . . Hadley joins their company as one of the most clear-sighted chroniclers of contemporary emotional journeys.” —Edmund Gordon, The Guardian “There is a grand sweep and an emotional charge that brings to mind DH Lawrence.” —Elena Seymenliyska, Daily Telegraph (London)) “An exceptional storyteller.” —Library Journal “Shrewd, insightful, unpredictable.” —Kirkus Reviews

A short story by Tessa Hadley from the collection Reader, I Married Him: Stories inspired by Jane Eyre.

In this New York Times Notable Book from one of today’s most acclaimed writers, two lives stretched between two cities converge in a chance meeting that will irrevocably change their lives. “Hadley is a supremely perceptive writer of formidable skill and intelligence, someone who goes well beyond surfaces.”—New York Times Book Review Unsettled by the recent death of his mother, Paul sets out in search of Pia, his daughter from his first marriage, who has disappeared into the labyrinth of London. Discovering her pregnant and living illegally in a run-down council flat with a pair of Polish siblings, Paul is entranced by Pia’s excitement at living on the edge. Abandoning his second wife and their children in Wales, he joins her to begin a new life in the heart of London. Cora, meanwhile, is running in the opposite direction, back to Cardiff, to the house she has inherited from her parents. She is escaping her marriage, and the constrictions and disappointments of her life in London. But there is a deeper reason why she cannot stay with her decent Civil Service husband; the aftershocks of which she hasn’t fully come to terms with herself. Connecting both stories is the London train, and a chance meeting that will have immediate and far-reaching consequences for both Paul and Cora.

The profoundly different choices of a mother and her daughter infuse this rich, expansive novel with both intimate detail and wide resonance When Joyce Stevenson is thirteen, her family moves to the south of England to live with their aunt Vera. Joyce''s mother, Lil, is a widow; Vera has a husband who keeps his suits in the wardrobe but spends evenings at another house nearby. While the two sisters couldn''t be more different-Vera, a teacher, has unquestioning belief in the powers of education and reason; Lil puts her faith in séances-they work together to form a tight-knit family. Joyce sees that there is something missing in their lives: men. She doesn''t want to end up like her aunt Vera, rejected by her husband. Joyce discovers art at school: she falls in love with the Impressionists and, eventually, with one of her teachers. In spite of the temptations of the sixties, she is determined to make her marriage and motherhood a success. When Joyce''s daughter, Zoe, grows up and has a baby of her own, however, she proves to be impatient with domestic life and chooses a dramatically different path. Spanning five decades of extraordinary changes in women''s lives, Everything Will Be All Right explores the complicated relationships of a family. The young ones of each generation are sure that they can correct the mistakes of their parents; the truth, of course, is more opaque. Intricate and insightful, Everything Will Be All Right firmly establishes Tessa Hadley among the great contemporary observers of the human mind and heart.

A Picador Paperback Original Tessa Hadley''s stories trace the currents of desire, desperation, and mischief that that lie hidden inside domestic relationships. A mother hears her son''s confession that he''s cheating on his girlfriend; a student falls in love with a professor and initiates an affair with a man who looks just like him. A boy on a seaside vacation realizes that a grown-up woman is pressing dangerously close. In Tessa Hadley''s Sunstroke and Other Stories, everyone conspires to hold the loving and stable surface of family life together, as old secrets and new appetites threaten to blow it apart.

Tessa Hadley examines how Henry James progressively disentangled himself from the moralizing frame through which English-language novels in the nineteenth century had imagined sexual passion. Hadley argues that his relationship with the European novel tradition was crucial, helping to leave behind a way of seeing in which only ''bad'' women could be sexual. She reads James''s transitional fictions of the 1890s as explorations of how disabling and distorting ideals of women''s goodness and purity were learned and perpetuated within English and American cultural processes. These explorations, Hadley argues, liberate James to write the great heterosexual love affairs of the late novels, with their emphasis on the power of pleasure and play: themes which are central to James''s ambitious enterprise to represent the privileges and the pains of turn-of-the-century leisure class society.

Alexandr, Christine, Lydia et Zachary partagent une amitié très intime depuis leur rencontre alors qu’ils avaient vingt ans. Trente ans plus tard, Alex et Christine reçoivent un appel bouleversé de Lydia : Zach est mort. Ce décès les touche profondément. Tous s’accordent pour dire que Zach était le plus sain et le plus gentil d’entre eux, celui qu’ils ne pouvaient se permettre de perdre. Plutôt que de les rapprocher, la perte de Zach déforme leur relation, faisant remonter à la surface les enchevêtrements passés, les griefs tus. Ce qui aurait pu les unir se transforme alors en colère et amertume. Occasions tardives explore les entrelacs des relations les plus intimes. Sous la surface des arrangements et compromis de l’existence reposent d’autres configurations, différentes, insondables, qui, bien que semblant appartenir au passé, demeurent la trame essentielle des amitiés et des amours. Et quand un fil rompt, tout se détricote, la trame réaffirme sa présence.

Short story writers often say that, for maximum dramatic effect, you should arrive fashionably late to a scene. After years of living in the literary wilderness, it seems the short story’s own moment has finally arrived. The last twelve months have marked an extraordinary year for the form. The Nobel Prize for Literature, the Man Booker International Prize, the Folio Prize and the Independent Foreign Fiction Prize were all awarded to short story writers. The shortlist for the BBC National Short Story Award 2014 captures the spirit of this mood and the short story’s knack for cutting straight to the action, the all-important moment of change. The five stories on this year’s shortlist were chosen by a panel of judges that included: poet and novelist Adam Foulds; author, illustrator and performer Laura Dockrill; editor Philip Gwyn Jones; BBC Editor of Books Di Speirs; and the broadcaster Alan Yentob, who chaired the panel and introduces this collection.

Três irmãs e um irmão regressam, para as últimas férias de verão, à velha casa dos avós. Trazem os filhos, uma nova esposa e o filho de um antigo namorado. Ao longo de três semanas, as memórias do passado e da infância voltam à superfície e as tensões aumentam, misturando-se com o ar quente e denso da paisagem idílica de uma pequena vila inglesa. Tessa Hadley constrói um magnífico romance, só ao alcance de uma extraordinária autora, onde as particularidades das ligações familiares, as suas crises e alegrias, assumem o papel de protagonistas, assegurando que o passado fará sempre parte de nós.

Tessa Hadley är en av vår tids främsta novellister och den författare som publicerat flest noveller i The New Yorker. En student blir förälskad i sin lärare och inleder en affär med en man som liknar honom. En hemhjälp som tar hand om en åldrande man upptäcker hemligheter ur hans förflutna. En nyskild kvinna får låna en lägenhet och blir besatt av ägarinnans före detta pojkvän. Noveller innehåller ett urval från Tessa Hadleys tre novellsamlingar. Tre av novellerna är inte tidigare publicerade i bokform.

Londra, 1967. Mentre in tutta Europa si propaga la contestazione giovanile c''è chi vive ancora nel vecchio mondo stabile e borghese dei quartieri residenziali protetti da giardini e segreti: ecco la famiglia Fischer. Phyllis, bella casalinga elegante e impeccabile, Roger, in carriera al Foreign Office, e i figli Colette, adolescente che legge troppo, e Hugh, il bambino perfetto. In una calda sera d''estate il figlio di una vecchia amica di Roger va a trovarli controvoglia, invitato a cena. Un bacio nel buio sembra una sciocchezza, un atto avventato e trascurabile, e invece è l''inizio di una catena di eventi imprevedibili. Phyllis, tormentata dall''accaduto, fa una scelta di rottura: abbandona la famiglia per un''idea di amore libero che la chiama e va a vivere con Nicky in una vecchia casa del centro, cadente, affascinante, occupata da artisti e lavoratori, gente nuova che sta creando un mondo nuovo. La sua decisione non potrà che avere conseguenze profonde sulle vite di tutti gli altri. Come di consueto, Tessa Hadley indaga l''animo umano con sottigliezza e va in profondità, mostrandoci luci e ombre di ogni personaggio e insieme una scena sociale che si trasforma con le persone e da loro viene trasformata.

Per festeggiare i 200 anni della nascita di Charlotte Brontë, Tracy Chevalier ha chiesto alle migliori autrici in lingua inglese di scrivere una storia ispirata alla celebre battuta di Jane Eyre: «L’ho sposato, lettore mio». Questo racconto fa parte della raccolta dedicata a Charlotte Brontë: L’ho sposato, lettore mio a cura di TRACY CHEVALIER

En ny fängslande roman om en kvinnas sexuella och intellektuella uppvaknande i 60-talets swinging London av författaren till "Syskonen" och "Sent på dagen". 1967. Medan London vaknar till liv av den nya ungdomsrevolutionen verkar förortsfamiljen Fischer tillhöra en äldre värld av konventionell stabilitet: den vackra och plikttrogna hemmafrun Phyllis är gift med Roger, en hängiven pappa med en karriär i utrikesdepartementet. Men när en gammal väns tjugoåriga son kommer hem till familjen en varm sommarkväll och kysser Phyllis i den mörka trädgården efter middagen, händer något inom henne. I detta uppvaknande gör Phyllis ett val som går emot alla förväntningar på henne som hustru och mamma. Med skalpellskarp insikt utforskar Tessa Hadley sina karaktärers inre världar och avslöjar deras rädslor och längtan. Med de vågade och sensuella undertonerna är Fri kärlek en oemotståndlig utforskning av romantisk kärlek, sexuell frihet och att leva ut den mest sanna och meningsfulla versionen av oss själva. Det är en roman som visar prov på Hadleys enastående förmåga att ”skriva om medvetandet så innerligt, fullt ut, att det höjer och utökar ens eget”. (Lily King, författare till Euphoria.)

Fyra syskon semestrar i sin barndoms sommarstuga. Roland kommer med sin nya fru som systrarna inte tycker om. Alice har med sig en gammal kärleks tonårsson som smider planer att förföra Rolands dotter. Fran kommer utan sin man som prioriterat turné med bandet. Och äldsta systern Harriet får sin självbild sönderslagen när passionen slår till. Nuet och det förflutna glider in i och påverkar varandra tills allt är förändrat.

An unforgettable story about two sisters and a night that changes everything, from the master chronicler of our heart’s hidden desires. ‘Tessa Hadley is my favourite author’ KATE ATKINSON Evelyn had the surprising thought that bodies were sometimes wiser than the people inside them. She’d have liked to impress somebody with this idea, but couldn’t explain it. On a winter Saturday night in post-war Bristol, sisters Moira and Evelyn, on the cusp of adulthood, go to an art students’ party in a dockside pub; there they meet two men, Paul and Sinden, whose air of worldliness and sophistication both intrigues and repels them. Sinden calls a few days later to invite them over to the grand suburban mansion Paul shares with his brother and sister, and Moira accepts despite Evelyn’s misgivings. As the night unfolds in this unfamiliar, glamorous new setting, the sisters learn things about themselves and each other that shock them, and release them into a new phase of their lives. ‘Few writers give me such consistent pleasure’ ZADIE SMITH ‘Hadley’s extraordinary skill [is] making both surface life and deep interiors come fully alive’ COLM TÓIBÍN ‘Tessa Hadley recruits admirers with each book’ HILARY MANTEL *A BOOK OF THE YEAR IN THE SUNDAY TIMES*

E se uma mulher de meia-idade decidir recusar tudo o que lhe parece destinado na família, na casa, na vida? Na culturalmente inquieta Londres dos anos 60, a família suburbana Fischer pertence a um mundo de segurança convencional: Phyllis é uma bonita dona de casa, apta a tudo, casada com Roger, um pai afeiçoado e senhor de uma esplêndida carreira política. Os seus filhos são Colette, uma adolescente estudiosa, e Hugh, o predestinado menino de ouro. Mas, quando o filho de vinte e poucos anos de um velho amigo visita os Fischer para jantar e acaba a beijar Phyllis no escuro do jardim, algo nela se inflama. Phyllis fará uma escolha que desafia as expectativas que sobre ela incidem enquanto mulher e mãe. E, à medida que a agitação na família espelha a transformação dramática da sociedade londrina da época, descobrir-se-á que nada na vida dos Fischer era tão estável e resolvido quanto parecia.

Alex, Christine, Zachary, Lydia si conoscono da quando hanno vent''anni, anche da prima, e ora ne hanno un po'' più di cinquanta. Hanno amato, odiato, scelto strade giuste e sbagliate, o non hanno scelto affatto; hanno cresciuto bambini, creato case, covato e soffocato ambizioni. Quando Zachary muore all''improvviso l''equilibrio magico che reggeva il loro quartetto salta; Lydia, l''eterna seduttrice, non sa stare da sola, va a vivere a casa di Alex e Chris, occupa un territorio non suo col disordine degli oggetti e l''invadenza affascinante che è sempre stata il suo tratto. Ciò che succede è imprevisto e insieme fatale. Ma questo non è solo un romanzo di coppie fluide, di amore e amicizia e ancora amore intrecciati fino a cancellare o calpestare i limiti; c''è anche l''arte, comprata e venduta da Zachary nella sua bonomia esuberante, cercata e praticata con fatica e pudore da Chris, ripudiata per orgoglio da Alex; ci sono i figli: la selvatica Grace, la solida, seria Isobel, l''ombroso Sandy con la sua musica; e ci sono le città belle: la Londra dei vicoli segreti e delle gallerie, sempre tagliata da una luce prodigiosa, e Venezia, luogo di una vacanza pigra ed equivoca. Tessa Hadley fa musica da camera con le parole, le sceglie una per una, gioca con le simmetrie e i contrasti, racconta semplicemente la vita, che semplice non è mai.

Alex och Christine, och Lydia och Zach, har varit vänner sedan tjugoårsåldern, långt innan de blev två gifta par. Nu trettio år senare lever de ett stilla medelklassliv i London – tills en förtvivlad Lydia en dag ringer från sjukhuset och berättar att Zach har dött av en hjärtinfarkt. Alla tre är överens om att Zach, med sitt generösa och jordnära sätt, var den oersättliga, den som de inte hade råd att förlora. Men istället för att de kommer varandra nära i den gemensamma sorgen, börjar ouppklarade problem och oförrätter från förr långsamt stiga upp till ytan. Med precision och stor inlevelse blottlägger Tessa Hadley de komplexa trådar som våra mest intima relationer består av.

In Tessa Hadleys Erzählungen sind es die alltäglichen Begebenheiten, die sich als außergewöhnlich erweisen: Zwei junge Mütter verbringen den Sommer mit ihren Männern und Kindern in einem Cottage auf dem Land - und beginnen beide einen Flirt mit einem befreundeten Arzt. Ein Sohn gesteht der Mutter, seine Freundin zu betrügen. Eine Studentin verkündet ihren Eltern am Küchentisch, dass sie ihren Professor heiraten wird. Ein Teenager ist zugleich überfordert und geschmeichelt von den Avancen einer verheirateten Frau, die sich am Strand dicht an ihn drängt. Mit ihrem feinen Gespür für die Bruchstellen familiärer Geborgenheit kreist Tessa Hadley in acht Erzählungen um die großen Themen des Lebens, um Freundschaft und Liebe, Sexualität und Mutterschaft. Hadley fordert ihre Figuren, reißt sie heraus aus ihrem Alltag und öffnet ihnen Wege in ein neues Leben, von dem sie selbst noch nichts ahnen. Emotional, aber nicht sentimental, und mit wachem Blick für die entscheidenden Details gibt sie tiefe Einblicke in die Komplexität menschlicher Beziehungen - und zeigt einmal mehr, dass sie eine der wichtigsten Schriftstellerinnen Großbritanniens ist.

Sommer 1967. Die Welt ist in Aufruhr. Die Jugend geht auf die Straße. Doch die Fischers neigen nicht dazu, aus der Reihe zu tanzen. Ihre kleine Welt in einem Londoner Vorort ist grundsolide: Die hübsche Phyllis kümmert sich rührend um den Haushalt und um die beiden Kinder, den neunjährigen Hugh, ihren Goldjungen, und die fünfzehnjährige Colette, während Gatte Roger im Außenministerium Karriere macht. Doch als der kaum zwanzigjährige Nicholas Knight in einer schwülen Sommernacht heftig mit Phyllis flirtet und sie schließlich leidenschaftlich küsst, gerät alles durcheinander. Phyllis nimmt die Welt mit neuen Augen wahr und trifft eine Entscheidung, die allen Erwartungen an eine brave Ehefrau und Mutter zuwiderläuft. Scharfsinnig und mit großer Empathie erforscht Tessa Hadley das Innenleben ihrer Figuren, ihre Ängste und Sehnsüchte. Freie Liebe erzählt auf unwiderstehlich sinnliche, einfühlsame und kluge Weise von einer Frau, die sich aus dem Korsett eines bürgerlichen Lebens zu befreien versucht, von den Möglichkeiten und Grenzen romantischer Liebe, von Pflichten und Auf- brüchen - und den Folgen, die das Streben nach Selbstverwirklichung haben kann.