Tessa Hadley

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The Party

An irresistible novella about two sisters and a night that changes everything, from the master chronicler of our heart's hidden desires

Evelyn had the surprising thought that bodies were sometimes wiser than the people inside them. She'd have liked to impress somebody with this idea, but couldn't explain it.

On a winter Saturday night in post-war Bristol, sisters Moira and Evelyn, on the cusp of adulthood, go to an art students' party in a dockside pub; there they meet two men, Paul and Sinden, whose air of worldliness and sophistication both intrigues and repels them. Sinden gets hold of their phone number, but the sisters don't expect further contact and are surprised when he calls a few days later to invite them to another party, at the grand suburban mansion Paul shares with his brother and sister. Moira accepts despite Evelyn's misgivings, and as the night unfolds in this unfamiliar, glamorous new setting, the sisters learn things about themselves and each other that shock them, and release them into a new phase of their lives.

In this irresistible novella of two young women coming of age, Tessa Hadley explores the ever-changing desires, the sudden revelations and the lasting mysteries that are bound up with who we are, and who we might become.