Books by Esther Freud

Summer, 1914. It is Emanuel's twenty-first birthday, and eleven-year-old Eva and her sisters are helping transform Gaglow for a glorious party. But their brother's arrival is overshadowed by the talk of war that comes with him from Hamburg, and when he is wrenched from the family to serve his country, Eva knows that nothing will be the same again.

On a holiday with her father, Lara meets the Willoughby family, rife with illicit alliances and vendettas. The more embroiled Lara becomes with them, and with the beautiful Kip, the more consumed she is with doubt, curiosity and dread. And so begins her journey into self discovery and across the fine line between childhood and what lies beyond.

Sixteen-year-old Lisa has high hopes for her first year in London. But she is squeezed into a flat with her bohemian mother and a little brother obsessed with foxes. Lisa trails through the city, dabbling with drugs and romance, and refusing to lose faith in her belief that something fantastic will happen to mark the rest of her life.

The architect Klaus Lehmann loves his wife, Elsa, with a passion that continues throughout their married life, despite long periods of separation. Almost half a century after Lehmann's death in the village of Steerborough, a young woman, Lily, arrives to research his life and work. Poring over Klaus's letters to Elsa, Lily pieces together the story of their lives. And alone in her rented cottage by the sea, she begins to sense an absence in her own life that may not be filled by simply going home.

Two little girls are taken by their mother to Morocco on a 1960s pilgrimage of self-discovery. For Mum it is not just an escape from the grinding conventions of English life but a quest for personal fulfilment; her children, however, seek something more solid and stable amidst the shifting desert sands. Just open the book and begin, and instantly you will be first of all charmed, then intrigued and finally moved by this fascinating story Spectator.