snoopy56
member
Reged: 28/08/2007
Posts: 199
Loc: Norfolk
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'In 1934 Idina Sackville met the son she had last seen fifteen years earlier when she shocked high society by running off to Africa with a near penniless man, abandoning him, his brother and their father.'
The author of this book is Idina's great-grandaughter so she had access to material and sources which might not have been made available to other writers. This makes for a meticulously researched and detailed book with lots of references. I found Idina's story fascinating and a great insight into the life of the 'fast' set in the 1920s and 30s. The author says that part of the inspiration for the book was to find out what sort of mother could abandon her children and set up home in a foreign country. I think Idina was no different from a lot of women of her class at the time. Their children were largely raised by nannies and as the guilty party in a divorce case she felt that she had no choice but to leave them with their father. It's very sad that the boys didn't seem to have a very good relationship with their step-mother. Idina settled into the ex-pat community in Africa and spent the rest of her life there with only brief trips back to the UK. She married five times and in addition to her two sons with her first husband she had a daughter with her third husband Josslyn Hay, the Earl of Erroll.
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Ginnie
member
Reged: 24/06/2008
Posts: 1063
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Hi Snoopy
This was an excellent choice - thank you.
I was fascinated from beginning to end. I found that my opinion of Idina changed frequently. She, and her set led a life of debauchery, in my opinion, but then I felt sorry for her that she seemed to have no stability in her life. She lost her children for years and then sadly they died.
Although she belonged to a privileged group I wouldn't have wanted her life.
I think Frances Osborne has written a very good book.
Hope everyone else enjoyed it.
Ginnie
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Ginnie
member
Reged: 24/06/2008
Posts: 1063
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Another thought I had that I forgot to say. How different her life, and those of her set, was compared to the less privileged of the time. So many people were struggling just to make ends meet.
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