Author:Olivia Manning
'Her gallery of personages is huge, her scene painting superb, her pathos controlled, her humour quiet and civilised' Anthony Burgess
'So glittering is the overall parade - and so entertaining the surface - that the trilogy remains excitingly vivid; it amuses, it diverts and it informs, and to do these things so elegantly is no small achievement' Sunday Times
'A fantastically tart and readable account of life in eastern Europe at the start of the war' Sarah Waters
The Balkan Trilogy is the story of a marriage and of a war, a vast, teeming, and complex masterpiece in which Olivia Manning brings the uncertainty and adventure of civilian existence under political and military siege to vibrant life.
At the heart of the trilogy are newly-weds Guy and Harriet Pringle, who arrive in Bucharest - the so-called Paris of the East - in the autumn of 1939, just weeks after the German invasion of Poland. Guy's lecturing job awaits, alongside friends and the ever-ardent Sophie - but for Harriet, alone and naive, it's a strange new life. Other surprises follow: Romania joins the Axis, and before long German soldiers overrun the capital. The Pringles flee south to Greece, part of a group of refugees made up of White Russians, journalists, con artists, and dignitaries. In Athens, however, the couple will face a new challenge of their own...
Magnificent ... full of wit, sharp insight and vivid description.
—— The TimesA fantastically tart and readable account of life in eastern Europe at the start of war
—— Sarah WatersSo glittering is the overall parade- and so entertaining the surface that the trilogy remains excitingly vivid; it amuses, it diverts and it informs, and to do these things so elegantly is no small achievement.
—— Sunday TimesWonderfully entertaining
—— ObserverOne must salute the brilliance ... the exactness of sights and sounds, the precise touches of light and scent, the gestures and entrances
—— GuardianI shall be surprised, and, I must admit, dismayed if the whole work is not recognized as a major achievement in the English novel since the war. Certainly it is an astonishing recreation.
—— New York TimesA delicate, tough, mesmerising epic that grabs you by the hand and takes you straight into war, flight, and a complex and vulnerable young marriage
—— Louisa YoungGlittering characterisation, sharp and eloquent writing
—— Sunday TelegraphAn important 20th-century writer who paints a complex relationship between gender and power with wit and sensitivity
—— Lauren ElkinLush and lyrical - and darkly funny even at its most gut-punching - Olivia Manning's Balkan Trilogy manages to simultaneously be a sweeping panorama of a Europe in crisis and a discomfitingly intimate portrait of a no-less-broken marriage.
—— Tara Isabella Burton, author of Social CreatureRereleased with glorious new covers ... it's an ambitious and classic series that'll utterly absorb you.
—— Stylist
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