Book description
'Bea treads carefully on the thick carpet, quite deliberately like
a servant. Her elder sister, Clemmie, tells her that it is "not
done" to worry about being heard but Bea enjoys this
oh-so-silent rebellion against convention. She teases back,
"This is the twentieth century, Clem, things are about to
change."'
London, 1914. Two young women dream of breaking free from tradition
and obligation; they know that suffragettes are on the march and that
war looms, but at 35 Park Lane, Lady Masters, head of a dying
industrial dynasty, insists that life is about service and duty.
Below stairs, housemaid Grace Campbell is struggling. Her family in
Carlisle believes she is a high earning secretary, but she has barely
managed to get work in service - something she keeps even from her
adored brother. Asked to send home more money than she earns, Grace is
in trouble.
As third housemaid she waits on Miss Beatrice, the youngest daughter
of the house, who, fatigued with the social season, is increasingly
drawn into Mrs Pankhurst's captivating underground world of militant
suffragettes. Soon Bea is playing a dangerous game that will throw her
in the path of a man her mother wouldn't let through the front door.
Then war comes and it is not just their secrets - now on a collision
course - that will change their lives for good.
Brilliantly capturing a deeply fascinating period of British life in
which the normal boundaries of behaviour were overturned and the
social hierarchy could no longer be taken for granted, Park
Lane is as gripping and intense as Frances Osborne's number one
bestselling The Bolter.
Praise for The Bolter 'A tragic and deeply moving tale ... far more
gripping than any novel I have read for years' -- Antony Beevor Praise
for The Bolter 'Frances Osborne has brilliantly captured not only one
woman's life but an entire lost society' -- Amanda Foreman Praise for
The Bolter 'An enthralling account of a dazzling, troubled life' --
Julian Fellowes Born in London in 1969, Frances Osborne worked as a
barrister, investment research analyst and journalist before writing her
first book, Lilla's Feast. She is married to George Osborne, the
Chancellor of the Exchequer
