Everything Will Be All Right

By Tessa Hadley

Book Overview

When Joyce Stevenson is thirteen, her family moves to the south of England to live with their aunt Vera. Vera and her sister Lil aren't at all alike. Vera, a teacher, has unquestioning belief in the powers of education and reason; Lil puts her faith in seances. Joyce is determined to be different: she falls in love with art (and her art teacher). Spanning five decades of extraordinary change in women's lives, Tessa Hadley's Everything Will Be All Right explores the tangled history of one family and the disasters, hopes, compromises, and ambitions of successive generations.

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0312423640
• ISBN13: 9780312423643
• Release Date: November 2004
• Publisher: Picador USA
• Length: 320 Pages
• Weight: 0.77 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.8" x 5.5" x 8.5"

Customer Reviews

compelling characterizations

Tessa Hadley's Everything Will Be All Right is a lovely and compelling book. The narrative spans several decades in the lives of one family-and more specifically, in the lives of the women of the family. Three of the women in particular-Aunt Vera, the groundbreaking teacher; Joyce, the would-be artist; and Zoe, the brilliant scholar-lead us on the journey from post-WWII England to present. What we learn is that as the world around them changes at ever increasing speed, this family stays the same, particularly in their eventual acceptance of each other and in their gravitation to the the center--the women. Hadley's writing is clear and often beautiful without being over the top, but the mastery of this novel is her ability to create and maintain characters. They simply live and breathe and stay in the room with the reader long after the book is finished. I was taken with this book from first word to last and would recommend it without reservation.

Everything Will Be All Right

Tessa Hadley turns out an evocative, clever romp of a novel... this book had me eager to keep turning pages. Everything Will Be All Right is interesting, exciting, and thought-provoking.I could really relate to Hadley's characters. I felt totally like I could relate to them, could feel their struggles and emotions.I recommend this book highly-- pick it up today if you want a fun, fast, exciting read!

one of the great writers of our time

Tessa Hadley is a truly great writer, of the Alice Munro/William Trevor tradition, but with a slightly more modern sensibility. It's too bad not more people seem to have heard of her (she has published a good number of excellent stories in the New Yorker) but my guess is that will change over time. If you like intelligent women's fiction, read this author!