{"product_id":"9781504039888","title":"A Weekend with Claude: A Novel","description":"\u003cb\u003eA group of \u003c\/b\u003e\u003cb\u003eeccentric\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cb\u003efriends makes a mess of their shared holiday in this witty novel from one of Britain’s best-loved authors.\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e When Claude stumbles upon an old photo, memories of a weekend spent in the company of his friends come back in full force. In the snapshot are Lily, a thick-ankled girl who is unlucky in love; Edward, the “awfully quiet and awfully nice” geologist Lily is trying to woo; “Victorian Norman,” a factory worker and Marxist romantic; and Shebah, an elderly Jewish drama queen who used to be in show business. But during their country-house holiday, there was deception and drama lurking behind the scenes.\u003cbr\u003e  \u003cbr\u003e Through the voices of each of Claude’s guests, author Beryl Bainbridge weaves a darkly comic tale of everyday people grasping for love—or lust—as a means of revolt against the mundane normalcy of their lives. Confined for a night and a day, they make a muck of all social pleasantries and put their friendships on the line.\u003cbr\u003e  \u003cbr\u003e First written in 1967, then revised and republished in 1982, \u003ci\u003eA Weekend with Claude\u003c\/i\u003e marks a stylistic departure from Bainbridge’s renowned third-person novels, such as \u003ci\u003eThe Bottle Factory Outing\u003c\/i\u003e and \u003ci\u003eInjury Time\u003c\/i\u003e. Yet the master writer’s singular morbidity and black humor abound, making this a welcome and entertaining read with “the kind of dreamy, evocative quality we associate with the films of Éric Rohmer” (\u003ci\u003eThe\u003c\/i\u003e\u003ci\u003eNew York Times\u003c\/i\u003e).\u003cbr\u003e  ","brand":"Open Road Media","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":47143310033136,"sku":"9781504039888","price":10.99,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0737\/7593\/9824\/files\/9781504039888_p0.jpg?v=1763711638","url":"https:\/\/shop-qa.barnesandnoble.com\/products\/9781504039888","provider":"Barnes \u0026 Noble (DEV)","version":"1.0","type":"link"}