- Hardcover: 320 pages
- Publisher: Virago Press Ltd; illustrated edition edition (1 May 2008)
- Language English
- ISBN-10: 1844084817
- ISBN-13: 978-1844084814
- Product Dimensions: 23.6 x 16.3 x 3.3 cm
- Average Customer Review: 3.7 out of 5 stars See all reviews (54 customer reviews)
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Amazon Bestsellers Rank:
17,971 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
- #12 in Books > Biography > Political > Countries & Regions > Africa
- #14 in Books > Biography > Historical > Countries & Regions > Africa
- #85 in Books > Biography > Political > Britain
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Product Description
Review
** 'Passionate and headstrong, Lady Idina was determined to be free even if the cost was scandal and ruin. Frances Osborne has brilliantly captured not only one woman's life but an entire lost society' Amanda Foreman
Marianne Brace, Independent
'Osborne is an imaginative scene painter... Idina wasn't admirable, but Osborne makes us sympathise with her.'
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Customer Reviews
Most Helpful Customer Reviews
50 of 54 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback
Well I won't hold back on this... I loved this book. However I can understand why some people out there might not like it so much, but more of that later. The Bolter can be summed up pretty much by its full title `The Bolter: Idina Sackville - The Woman Who Scandalized 1920's Society and Became White Mischief's Infamous Seductress'. This book promises to be full of gossip and scandal whilst taking a look at just what was going on in the rich upper classes in the 1920's and 1930's. It does exactly what it promises on that front with some very insightful tales even of royalty. It also lifts the lid further on `The Happy Valley' (which I had no knowledge of prior to this book - but I have been looking up on the web like mad) in Africa where bed hopping, drug taking, suicide and murder along with attempted murder all took place.
These things were great, Frances Osborne makes a lot of affairs and bed hopping very easy to keep up with and digest. She also brings in some really interesting social history such as what could and couldn't constitute the rights for divorce and what counted as adultery. She looked at the women suffragettes which were something that Idina and her mother Muriel were very much involved with. It also looks at how war affected people not just in terms of rations but in terms of love and affairs of the heart. All this was wonderfully written and all over too quickly. However for me it was the background on Idina herself along with her childhood, parents and the society she grew up in and how they made her into the character which she became that I found so fascinating.
Yes she was a sexual predator in some ways, no she couldn't be faithful, married and divorced five times, loved to party and left her sons and husband but deep down her story is of struggle and tragedy and how people react to that. Plus she in historical terms as Frances (who is her great-granddaughter) finds, from her family alone regardless of society back in the day, is blamed for this and getting the real insight your opinion is changed. Her first marriage to her true love wasn't a happy one after the war and he ended up marrying his sister's best friend Barbie. Some of the names in this book are wonderful. If all the things that happened to her happened to most people they would have given up aged about 21. However Idina is incredibly strong and fights and pushes to get what she wants which you believe is actually a quite settled life just with lots of sex.
This book also did something that very few books tend to do nowadays (unless I am having trouble keeping up) which is to make notes. There are some wonderful quotes such as when Idina describes why she married one of her husbands `he had broad shoulders, a long attention span and an endless supply of handkerchiefs' and facts that I felt I wanted to chase up and learn more about. I also laughed and smiled quite a lot too thinking that anyone who loves the words and works of Nancy Mitford would be right at home with this. It does appear she very much borrowed from Idina and her real story for her own fiction. I also actually felt very solemn when the book ended and quite moved.
All in all a marvellous book which I would recommend to Mitford fans and particularly people who wouldn't normally pick up a non fiction novel
These things were great, Frances Osborne makes a lot of affairs and bed hopping very easy to keep up with and digest. She also brings in some really interesting social history such as what could and couldn't constitute the rights for divorce and what counted as adultery. She looked at the women suffragettes which were something that Idina and her mother Muriel were very much involved with. It also looks at how war affected people not just in terms of rations but in terms of love and affairs of the heart. All this was wonderfully written and all over too quickly. However for me it was the background on Idina herself along with her childhood, parents and the society she grew up in and how they made her into the character which she became that I found so fascinating.
Yes she was a sexual predator in some ways, no she couldn't be faithful, married and divorced five times, loved to party and left her sons and husband but deep down her story is of struggle and tragedy and how people react to that. Plus she in historical terms as Frances (who is her great-granddaughter) finds, from her family alone regardless of society back in the day, is blamed for this and getting the real insight your opinion is changed. Her first marriage to her true love wasn't a happy one after the war and he ended up marrying his sister's best friend Barbie. Some of the names in this book are wonderful. If all the things that happened to her happened to most people they would have given up aged about 21. However Idina is incredibly strong and fights and pushes to get what she wants which you believe is actually a quite settled life just with lots of sex.
This book also did something that very few books tend to do nowadays (unless I am having trouble keeping up) which is to make notes. There are some wonderful quotes such as when Idina describes why she married one of her husbands `he had broad shoulders, a long attention span and an endless supply of handkerchiefs' and facts that I felt I wanted to chase up and learn more about. I also laughed and smiled quite a lot too thinking that anyone who loves the words and works of Nancy Mitford would be right at home with this. It does appear she very much borrowed from Idina and her real story for her own fiction. I also actually felt very solemn when the book ended and quite moved.
All in all a marvellous book which I would recommend to Mitford fans and particularly people who wouldn't normally pick up a non fiction novel
5 of 5 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback
I did not think I would enjoy this book as I had to read it for my book club. But the more I read the more I liked it.
Its the tale of a woman during the first world war and after. Her life seems to be fairly normal but then she becomes a scarlet woman after she bolts from her first marriage.
She runs away from her first marriage and sets off on a life of debauchery and many more marriages. But she pays a heavy personal price for that life.
Set in both England and Kenya among the upper classes who did not need to work, they just partied and had fun.
That fun often went way beyond what was accpetable and the life of Idina Sackville is a glimpse into a world I had no idea existed.
This is well worth the read and all the more riveting because it opens a door into a completely different world.
At the end of the book you can decide whethe r she was pushed into that life by circumstance or whether she was never the sort to settle quietly into the role of a good wife.
Its the tale of a woman during the first world war and after. Her life seems to be fairly normal but then she becomes a scarlet woman after she bolts from her first marriage.
She runs away from her first marriage and sets off on a life of debauchery and many more marriages. But she pays a heavy personal price for that life.
Set in both England and Kenya among the upper classes who did not need to work, they just partied and had fun.
That fun often went way beyond what was accpetable and the life of Idina Sackville is a glimpse into a world I had no idea existed.
This is well worth the read and all the more riveting because it opens a door into a completely different world.
At the end of the book you can decide whethe r she was pushed into that life by circumstance or whether she was never the sort to settle quietly into the role of a good wife.
37 of 41 people found the following review helpful
Format:Hardcover
I cannot help thinking that Idina "The Bolter" was not very interesting as a person. Her actions often seem so mindless, ill-thought through or simply horrible - like leaving her two young children behind to run off with some chap. Also, she doesn't really come through as a proper person, the occasional soundbites ("Simply heaven, darling") are hardly the sort of stuff to make her real and complex. But despite all that, I still enjoyed the book very much. It provides a unique insight into an era where people were totally and utterly different from today. Their daring, their irresponsibility, their disregard for their own well-being often leaves one gasping. I think Frances Osborne managed to paint a vivid picture of an era, even though the main character, Idina, remains opaque. And maybe that's not such a bad thing.
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Most Recent Customer Reviews
not too bad
It's not the events that make a great biography, it's the capacity of the biographer to write well.
I guess I have been spoiled by Selina Hastings and Laura Thompson,... Read more
I guess I have been spoiled by Selina Hastings and Laura Thompson,... Read more
Published 21 hours ago by John Davison
echoes of a fascinating era
This book will fascinate anybody with an interest in or memories of Kenya. The characters from the 'Happy Valley' period are almost beyond belief but I can remember some of them... Read more
Published 17 days ago by Charles
Loved this Book
What an incredible life and storey. I can understand how the Author was intrigued with trying to find out about her great grandmother. Read more
Published 2 months ago by madlric
great book
I came upon this book by accident and started to read. Insight into pre war aristocracy, lunching at the Ritz and wild parties whilst the majority of Britain were living on bread... Read more
Published 2 months ago by ant
Misleading title
This is not a biography of Idina Sackville. The majority of this book is devoted to the pedigrees of her contemporaries and husbands, how they obtained their wealth and the number... Read more
Published 4 months ago by Swizzlestick
The Bolter by Frances Osborn
I lived in Kenya from 1961 to 1982. The Bolter, Idina Sackville died in 1955 six years before my arrival in Nairobi. Read more
Published 7 months ago by R. A. Rach
Badly written and rather dull.
This book was one of two books I read over the summer for my local book group. I read the first two chapters and was so bored I lost the will to carry on and abandoned it for... Read more
Published 8 months ago by Mondoro
unreadable prose
I suspect the story is rather interesting, but the prose is so awful, without any style, wit or grace at all, that I had to give up.
Published 12 months ago by J. Carr
Worth the read
Idina Sackville certainly makess for fascinating subject matter, given her notoriety and unorthodox lifestyle. Read more
Published 12 months ago by Smylsie
Frustrating read.
Frances Osborne's subject matter is fascinating. Idina Sackville lead the kind of life that you could only possibly contemplate as a major Hollywood film, in fact I was thrilled to... Read more
Published 13 months ago by FuzzyLou
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