• Good Behaviour by Molly Keane
  • Good Behaviour by Molly Keane
  • Good Behaviour by Molly Keane
  • Good Behaviour unlined notebook by Molly Keane
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Good Behaviour

A BBC 2 Between the Covers Book Club Pick – Booker Prize Gems
  • Author
    • Molly Keane
£10.99
£10.99
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We kept our heads above the morass, stifled screaming despairs only by the exercise of Good Behaviour.

Behind the gates of Temple Alice, the aristocratic St Charles family is sinking into a state of decaying grace. Aroon, the unlovely daughter of the house, silently longs for affection - which she receives neither from her icy mother nor her hunting-obsessed father. The fierce forces of sex, money, jealousy and love seem stifled by the rules of good behaviour. But no crumbling codes of conduct can save the members of the St Charles family from their own dark secrets and repressed cruelties . . .

Introduced by Maggie O'Farrell

'Molly Keane is a mistress of wicked comedy' VOGUE

'Dark, complex, engaging . . . a wonderful tour de force' MARIAN KEYES

'I have read and re-read Molly Keane more, I think, than any other writer. Nobody else can touch her as a satirist, tragedian and dissector of human behaviour' MAGGIE O'FARRELL

'I really wish I had written this book...You read it with mounting horror and hilarity' HILARY MANTEL
  • Published: Jan 23 2025
  • 198 x 126mm
  • ISBN: 9780349019604
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Press Reviews

  • VOGUE
    An extraordinary tour de force of fictional presentation... a masterpiece... a technically remarkable work, as sharp as a blade... Molly Keane is a mistress of wicked comedy.
  • BOOKSELLER
    A witty, black comedy of manners, GOOD BEHAVIOUR is a memorable novel by an Irish writer whose only equal is Elizabeth Bowen.
  • Victoria Glendinning, SUNDAY TIMES
    A fine novel, wickedly alive
  • Edna O'Brien, OBSERVER
    Enchanting

  • Hilary Mantel

    I really wish I had written this book. It's a tragi-comedy set in Ireland after the First World War. A real work of craftsmanship, where the heroine is also the narrator, yet has no idea what is going on. You read it with mounting horror and hilarity as you begin to grasp her delusion

  • Maggie O'Farrell

    I have read and re-read Molly Keane more, I think, than any other writer. Nobody else can touch her as a satirist, tragedian, and dissector of human behaviour. I love all her books, but Good Behaviour and Loving and Giving are the ones I return to most
  • Vogue
    Molly Keane is a mistress of wicked comedy
  • Bookseller
    A witty, black comedy of manners, Good Behaviour is a memorable novel by an Irish writer whose only equal is Elizabeth Bowen

  • Victoria Glendinning

    Sunday Times
    A fine novel, wickedly alive

  • Edna O'Brien

    Observer
    Enchanting
  • New York Times
    Molly Keane's Good Behaviour presents a character whose own strict Christian code wreaks havoc on all those around her. Though she herself tells the tale, we somehow see her morality's disastrous consequences. Hilarious and sinister

  • Marian Keyes

    Dark, complex, engaging . . . a wonderful tour de force
  • Vulture
    Good Behaviour includes very little good behaviour, featuring instead delicious and deleterious accounts of illicit sex and wild high jinks, and a mother-daughter duo who can scrap with the best of them
  • Kirkus Reviews
    Wily, shrewd, and terribly sad all at the same time: the story of a soul shrivelling against cool, dark, shiny backgrounds
  • Guardian
    She was . . . marvellous

  • Diana Athill

    I admired many authors. But Molly, I loved
  • Evening Standard
    Keane's distinctive blend of elegant savagery and deep affection . . . its human relationships tortured like bonsai by good form, its open-hearted, sensual passion for horses, dogs and landscape
  • Wall Street Journal
    A writer of genius