Jane Jantet

Coming of Age Jane Jantet

February 1947, and post-war England is in the grip of bitter winter. At a prestigious girls' boarding school in the north of England a deeply unhappy ten-year-old tries to drown herself in a freezing pond and is rescued by two classmates. This is the shocking start to both 'In the Beginning ...', the first novel of The Coming of Age trilogy, and to a lifelong supportive friendship between the three girls, all of whom have found themselves, for very different reasons, to be torn between clashing worlds and to feel they belong nowhere. Ranging from the perils of wartime France to a bleak post-war North East England, and to the hedonism of London high society, the story asks questions about love in its various forms, loyalty, and the lies that people tell themselves and others in order to survive. Readers of Elizabeth Jane Howard, Tessa Hadley, Patrick Gale and Rosie Thomas will find themselves gripped by this magnificent debut novel.