Loitering with Intent

In London in 1949/1950, Fleur Talbot is struggling to complete her first novel, Warrender Chase. She manages to secure a job working for Sir Quentin Oliver as secretary to his Autobiographical Association, whose eccentric members intend to write their memoirs. (As is true of other of Spark's novels, there is much play on the inter-relationship of texts, with Newman's Apologia and Cellini's Autobiography constituting Fleur's essential reading.) As Fleur assists the club members she begins to notice that parts of her novel start to occur in real life. She begins to suspect that Sir Quentin may be blackmailing, poisoning or corrupting the association's members. Sir Quentin meanwhile discovers Fleur's novel-in-progress and seeks to suppress it. Fact and fiction intertwine with Sir Quentin's fate matching the fate of the character Warrender Chase.

• The Complete Review
• Virago Press

This article about a 1980s novel is a stub. You can help Wikipedia by expanding it. See guidelines for writing about novels. Further suggestions might be found on the article's talk page.

• v
• t
• e