The Golden Hours

I read the Cazalet books by Elizabeth Jane Howard a decade ago, starting after the death of the author and finishing up with All Change, about which I said:

For once I am not sorry that this is the end of the series, the series would probably have seemed complete at four books but this one does cap off the story well without tying up every loose end and I can use my imagination to guess where the characters go from here.

Well, fast forward to now and I saw there was a new volume written by someone else. Well, I’m not really a fan of keeping book series going after the death of the author. Mostly I think the series that get that treatment are long enough and popular enough that it’s just money grubbing really. But on the whole it only really happens with series I don’t read anyway so I can reject the concept without actually rejecting anything I’d actually read. I think one of the only books of the genre I’ve actually read was a new Agatha Christie written by Sophie Hannah which I wasn’t a great fan of. But the Cazalet Chronicles were a series that I did really enjoy so I found myself looking twice at this new book.

The original Cazalets were based on Elizabeth Jane Howard’s own family and Louisa Young turned out to be Howard’s niece by marriage, and she’s an established author in her own right. So yes, I got hold of a copy, via a request to the library, and prepared myself for disappointment.

This book picks up a little after All Change starting in 1962, and, perhaps because enough time has passed since I read that, I didn’t really notice the seams and I quickly found myself back in the heart of the family and captivated by the characters. The three girls Louise, Clary and Polly are now approaching forty years old and, though they are still definitely the heart of the book, most the other family members (and a couple of non-family too) get a moment to air their opinions as they did in the original series. There’s one thread to the story that surprised me and seemed out of place, and I don’t know how I’d feel about some of the characters if I’d read the other books more recently, but on the whole these felt like the same people I’d read about before. Everything comes slightly more up to date.

I gather there are more volumes planned and, having enjoyed this, I’m sure that I’ll be there reading them. I was tentative to start with but I definitely enjoyed the read. The next generation are introduced and I expect they will grow up and take over a bit more in the next episode, which is as it should be, and then it’ll be more of Louisa Young’s own story to tell. But I think the transition here has been managed well.