Riley Releases The Palm House, a Dust‑Storm Tale
Get the Culture newsletter
Daily culture — film, music, books, the trends and ideas worth your attention. Free.
- Gwendoline Riley publishes her seventh novel, The Palm House, which opens with a Sahara‑blown dust storm over London.
- Putnam is deputy editor of the literary magazine Sequence for 25 years, but resigns after his father's death and a clash with the new editor Simon Halfpenny.
- Laura, the narrator, works part‑time for a popular history magazine and lives in shared housing, reflecting the precarious finances of thirty‑somethings in London.
- Penelope Fitzgerald is cited by Riley as an influence, bringing a wry tenderness to the friendship between Laura and Putnam that distinguishes this novel from her earlier, harsher works.
- The novel’s style is described as “slim, impeccably controlled” with “bone‑dry humour” and “poet’s control,” delivering vignettes of Laura’s past—including a mother’s cruelty, a teenage crush on a stand‑up comedian, and an affair with an actor.
- London is portrayed as “out of date” and “unsettlingly strange” under the dust storm, with imagery of a “blood‑red sun” and a “jaundiced” city square.
- The ending returns to the pub where Laura and Putnam share a quiet moment over split packets of crisps, symbolising a “benediction” of ordinary companionship.
Why it matters: The novel offers readers a fresh, elegiac view of contemporary London’s precarious housing and work conditions, resonating with thirty‑somethings who juggle creative jobs and shared living. By shifting from Riley’s usual bleakness to tender friendship, it expands her literary range and invites a broader audience.
Ask SkimNews
