The Girls of Slender Means (New Directions Classic)

Probably like most people here I've come to this book having first read Muriel Spark's wonderful "The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie." "The Girls of Slender Means" has the same wonderfully sharp prose, which alone makes the book worth reading.Several people have commented that the beginning of the book is slow and that they were knocked out by the ending. I had the opposite reaction: the beginning, with its incredibly evocative portrait of London in 1945, fascinated me. The ending began to lose my interest a bit, though I can't reveal why without giving anything away.Still, all told, a highly recommended work.One word of caution, though: the Kindle edition is terrible, replete as it is with typos. I make a point when reading Kindle books to report content errors, and I had to do it dozens and dozens in this very short book. I hope New Directions makes the necessary corrections (some publishers seem to ignore them), because it was incredibly frustrating to run into mistakes page after page - really broke my reading flow.

This short novel set in London during and after the Second World War excels at creating interest without wasting words. It would be a good choice for a book club--there is so much to wonder and talk about. The Kindle Edition, unfortunately, is liberally sprinkled with typographical errors. It's pretty clear that no one proofread it.

Not my favorite Muriel Spark, I much preferred A Far Cry From Kensington. That said, the story stays with you, I pondered it for days, turning the characters over and over in my mind, what was it about, I feel as if I eventually figured it out. It is certainly well worth reading.

The Girls of Slender Means, are a group of girls that live in post-war London in 1945, and reside at the May of Teck Club, which is a hostel or group home. In the present, one of the characters, Jane Wright, who does "brain work" in the "world of books", is trying to contact all of the other girls who were in the May of Teck Club with her, to inform them of an event that takes place.This book is written in many characters points of view, and at first I had trouble keeping up with who was who. The book also jumps from past to present, and it takes a second to figure out which year you are in. The ending of this book was a little shocking, which makes it worth reading. This is a very short novel; however the writing style makes it a little harder to read. Muriel Spark throws in poetry at random places, and repeats it over and over (one of the girls is teaching elocution), which seems to halt the story as much as her jumping from viewpoint and time period.Overall opinion:I wouldn't really recommend this book to anyone, but I wouldn't discourage anyone from reading it either. I don't regret reading this book, but I definitely won't read it again.Please see more of my reviews at [...]

I enjoyed settling down with this interesting vignette of the lives and times of a group of single women in a hostel in London in the spring of 1945. The war in Europe has ended, and these unconquerable gals have survived. They have lived through the blitz; survived on low rations; and have kept their social world going by sharing one fancy dress among themselves. Blaring radios, and shrieks of laughter permeate the old building that has been their home for the last several years. Their amorous adventures have been fleeting ones in accord with the uncertainties of a world at war. We are now seeing them all as the first days of the rest of their lives are about to begin.Ah, but Ms. Spark is not telling us this story just to provide an evening's light entertainment. A tragedy occurs that once again points out the absurdity of war. It is sad that there has been no time in any of our lives when this message is obsolete. It's a short novel, almost a short story writ long, but it doesn't need to be any longer than it is. The author has taken just the amount of time she has needed to paint her colorful literary portrait...and then put a big smudge right in the middle of it.

I bought it on a critics review in the Wall Street Journal. Very unfortunate move. Thank you.

Wonderful humerous novel. Avoid Kindle edition. It is so poorly proofread that text is A incomprehensible in places

Wonderful book but horribly edited. Please fix! I feel I should get a refund for such shoddy work.

Any reader who has already been bitten with the Muriel Spark bug but has not got around to this story should embrace it eagerly. I’d call it one of her best (I have never yet read a bad one by her), but it probably needs some appreciation on the reader’s part of the atmosphere of England immediately after the war. Myself, I am not quite old enough to recall 1945 with any clarity, but come to that Dickens is before my time too. A little historical background goes a long way, and novelists of the calibre of Dickens or Spark will do the rest for us.Dame Muriel is very good at first pages, and the first page here is as good as any, easing the reader into the general scene and the particular atmosphere of middle-class young women improvising their lives in a house of multiple occupancy that has itself seen better days. The cast is fairly large for a short novel, but the effect created is of a kind of kaleidoscope, with the vivacious young things, plus a few who are not so young, flashing in and out of the narrative. There may or may not be a central character, and if there is it is presumably Jane, the first character named. One does not go to Muriel Spark for moral lessons, but this time she stays neutral – they do what they do because that is who they are. Conspicuously absent are the real rotters we find in some of her other novels, such as Patrick Seton or Father Socket in The Bachelors.One or two other standard Spark personae are given a rest this time. There are no Catholics for instance, unless one counts the young missionary, which I don’t. There are no Scots either, only one middle-aged spinster with a Scottish name. In particular there is a complete absence of the irrational, such as Mrs Hogg in The Comforters disappearing when alone because she has no private life. The author does not even tease us this time with inconclusive hints like the vague suggestions of a diabolic theme in The Ballad of Peckham Rye, much less go totally overboard into irrationality as she does in The Hothouse by the East River.The time-perspective flits around a bit, and that is certainly a Spark mannerism. However what I find very special here is the way the story bursts into abrupt action towards the end. It would be wrong to be specific about that in a review, and wrong in a different way because of the totally chance coincidence between my reading this book and a ghastly recent tragedy in London. The colours of the Spark kaleidoscope flare up threateningly, but the author stays in control, and there is maybe even a touch of rather uncharacteristic humanity this time.So, do I ‘recommend’ this novel? To tell the truth, I don’t know. I think it is rather marvellous, as I usually find Muriel Spark, but she may or may not be your cup of tea.

Variously described as “One of Spark’s most evocative novels”, and similar ambiguities, it may well be all of those things, but it is also, to me, utterly boring. I didn’t read any reviews before buying this book, because I admire Muriel Spark and have always enjoyed her work, so finding this book – hardly a story, more a catalogue of disconnected ramblings about residents in this war-time hostel – so difficult to read was particularly disappointing. To the extent that I gave up less than halfway through.

I really did not enjoy this book and particularly didn't like the style of writing. I read it for my Book Group so felt I should to finish it. Only saving grace was that it was so short!

My review has nothing to do with the content of the book,I have not read it yet..The copy I received is at best,a second.it has been badly bound so the it is impossible to read about a third of the page for the first 17 pages. There was no suggestion I was ordering a second ( nor did the price suggest this). There is claerly no quality control or checking books before they are despatched

A slender and sublime read. Immersive and compelling dark humour with wholly believable characters.