Product Description

Through the pages of this journal, begun in the summer of 1939 when she was almost 17, Joan Wyndham charts the progress of her education in sex, love and life among Chelsea's Bohemian community of the wartime years. Strictly brought up by a religious mother and her eccentric female companion, the author throws off her convent past and girlish ways when she meets a dissolute German sculptor at a party and falls in love with him. He introduces her to a noisy society far removed from her own - a world of late nights, loose talk and easy sex, and a raffish community of painters, poets and poseurs among whom her innocence makes her a celebrity. On the advice of her new friends Joan takes up painting, only to find her attic studio swarming with the exotic low-life of Redcliffe Road. As the diary comes to its close in May 1942, the mood has changed. London is in ruins, old friends are dead, and lovers are betrayed. Two years older and a lifetime wiser, the author has volunteered for the WAAF. The girl has become a woman, and the world in which she came of age has gone for ever.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #2055114 in Books
• Published on: 1995-09-04
• Released on: 1996-02-05
• Formats: Abridged, Audiobook
• Original language: English
• Number of items: 2
• Binding: Audio Cassette

Customer Reviews

Extremely funny
Someone reprint this book. Joan Wyndham is terribly funny and her diaries are perfect reading for anyone who had an adventurous adolescence and wants to remember what it was like to be uncynical about adults. The first volume, in particularis brilliant. Joan Wyndham comes accross as an incredibly likable woman with a passion for life. If you like this you'll also like Love in a Cold Climate by Jessica Mitford.