The Queen of the Tambourine

By Jane Gardam

Winner of the Whitbread Prize for Best Novel of the Year.

From the author of Old Filth.

With prose that is vibrant and witty, The Queen of the Tambourine traces the emotional breakdown—and eventual restoration—of Eliza Peabody, a smart and wildly imaginative woman who has become unbearably isolated in her prosperous London neighborhood. The letters Eliza writes to her neighbor, a woman whom she hardly knows, reveal her self-propelled descent into madness. Eliza must reach the depths of her downward spiral before she can once again find health and serenity. This story of a woman’s confrontation with the realities of sanity will delight readers who enjoy the works of Anita Brookner, Sybille Bedford, Muriel Spark, and Sylvia Plath.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Penguin Group
• Release date: Sep 1, 2007
• ISBN: 9781609450373

Reviews for The Queen of the Tambourine

[cariola_6 · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

Sorry to say that, in the end, I'm rather disappointed with this one. Gardam uses an epistolary framework--although it's hard to remember that midway, when the letters become so lengthy and self-absorbed that the reader forgets there is a supposed recipient. The writer/narrator, Eliza Peabody, is a middle-aged know-it-all who initially feels compelled to proffer her superior wisdom--gained a s a hospice volunteer--to her neighbor, Joan, who apparently suffers from debilitating pain in one leg. Eliza has decided that Joan's pain is psychosomatic and advises her to just get over it, offering her own help as an amateur psychotherapist. Surprisingly, after a few more letters, it is discovered that Joan has run off, leaving her leg brace in the marital bed. Although Joan never replies to Eliza's letters, we learn that she has embarked on a new life, travelling to exotic locations and having affairs with much younger foreign men. Periodically, gifts from Joan arrive--but never a letter. In the meantime, Eliza's own life takes a turn for the worst as her husband moves out to take a flat with Joan's abandoned husband. The letters continue, with Eliza portraying herself, narcissistically, as the abandoned spouse, now abandoned as well by any borderline friends she might have had, and making herself out to be the heroine of everyone's lives, from Joan's university-student daughter to Barry, a young man dying of AIDS in the hospice.Initially, I was intrigued by Eliza's voice, which Gardam conveyed with much humor. But as the letters dragged on and the descriptions of her own escapades and musings became longer and more self-pitying, I got bored. Yes, I do understand that what Gardam was trying to portray was the sadness and near-madness of a woman who has isolated herself from everyone; it just didn't particularly interest me, and I found the one-sided epistolary device tedious.Three stars for the writing and the creation of a complete character, plus the initial humor is Eliza's self-deceptive letters to Joan. But Gardam has written much better novels.

[lkernagh · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

I am a fan of epistolary novels, especially the ones that take the form of self-revelation (cue We Need to Talk About Kevin). One typically doesn’t expect a story about a “self-propelled descent into madness” to sparkle with sharp observation and sardonic witticism of the type typically found in stories by another favorite British author, Muriel Spark, but Gardam has done just that. Eliza is an interesting subject. A 50-something woman, married to a senior Foreign Office official, living in an affluent South London suburb who fills her otherwise empty days volunteering at the local hospice and walking the family dog on the Commons. Eliza’s letters to Joan – who readers learn has flown the family marriage home for global experiences – start out as simple inquiries. As the letters continue, they become more detailed, and increasingly introspective in nature, revealing Eliza’s marriage troubles, her opinions of her neighbours and rather disturbing glimpses into Eliza’s growing erratic personality. Eliza’s heart, for the most part, is in the right place but her mind is proving to be a bit more challenging. The fact that Eliza is an unreliable narrator quickly becomes apparent and it is that unreliability that helps propel this story forward to its suspenseful, poignant conclusion. I can see why this won the 1991 Whitbread Award.Overall, a fabulous portrait of one woman’s downward spiral of instability. This story is sure to appeal to Muriel Spark fans.

[lisapeet · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

I can't remember when I last read something that was so funny and so sad at the same time, and not sad in a sentimental way or funny in a slapstick way. A very bittersweet novel, with the emphasis, pleasingly, on the sweet. And deeply compassionate while at the same time managing to poke fun at everyone. Quite a surprise, and now I'm looking forward to the rest of my Gardam reading.

[amanaceerdh · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

i loved the main character of this book. then she starts going mad and it was hard to tell what was really happening. the book was filled with humor though and included lots of interesting and vivid characters, each with of story of their own. if it weren't for my confusion with the madness, i would have given it more stars. will definitely read more of jane garden's books! and i love these little europa editions!

[dawnlovesbooks · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

i loved the main character of this book. then she starts going mad and it was hard to tell what was really happening. the book was filled with humor though and included lots of interesting and vivid characters, each with of story of their own. if it weren't for my confusion with the madness, i would have given it more stars. will definitely read more of jane garden's books! and i love these little europa editions!

[cammykitty · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

The reviewer before me called this a "modern twist on The Yellow Wallpaper." I see where that came from, but that doesn't describe the book I read. Yes, our dear Eliza has hallucinations, but she isn't trapped anymore than she chooses to be. Perhaps she's mad, but perhaps as one of her neighbors suggest, she has the most annoying type of madness, deliberately chosen madness. Although I would never want to be Eliza's neighbor, friend, and definitely not her charge, I thoroughly enjoyed seeing the world criticized through her "naive" eyes. She's only as naive as one of Shakespeare's fools. Eliza has traveled the world as a Foreign Service Officer's wife, she's seen political upheaval and poverty, she's done her round of ladies clubs and ladies charities, yet she's living in an upscale suburb of England where the world's problems, in theory, don't exist. Eliza knows better. Her madness tears a little hole in her sheltered road that she lives on, her community called "The Road," so gentrified that it deserves capital letters. As for the people around her? Maybe they need a bit of her madness.

[sunfi_1 · Rating: 2 out of 5 stars]

Tried to read this one but I couldn't get into it. I didn't find Eliza to be a very sympathetic character and I found it difficult to relate to her. The story is told as a series of letters that she rights to a neighbor, through the first seventy pages there wasn't any other dialogue other than her telling about the happenings around the neighborhood.

[1morechapter · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

Queen of the Tambourine by Jane Gardam is an epistolary novel about 51 year old Eliza Peabody. All the letters are from Eliza to Joan, a woman from across the street who has disappeared. She writes to Joan just telling her the ordinary things going on about her days. No one will talk to Eliza about Joan, though, and it seems everyone is worried about Eliza. Her husband Henry has just left her, and she’s having a difficult time dealing with it.This novel explores one woman’s condition when she’s on the edge of madness. The beginning and the ending were strong, but I had a difficult time knowing what was going on in the middle of the book until it became clearer in the end. There were many funny parts to it, too, but overall it was just an okay read.

[janehyde_1 · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

The Queen of the Tambourine --- Jane GardamJane Gardam is a writer whose prose will spoil you for lesser writers. No words are gratuitous, everything that is said is there for a reason, whether to create an immediate and specific effect or to plant a seed which, if the reader is closely attentive, will bear fruit at some point in the novel. I discovered Gardam’s award-winning book for children, The Hollow Land, in a graduate children’s literature seminar and have looked for her books in second hand and new shops ever since. In the wonderful Powell’s in Portland last March I found a copy of The Summer of the Maidens, the story of three British young women in 1945 England as they have graduated from school and are ready for their adult lives. While one must surmise that Gardam identifies most closely with the academic Letty, all three are fully drawn characters of their time.In The Queen of the Tambourine Gardam creates a complex picture of a retired diplomatic wife facing middle age and the loss of meaning from her life. Through a series of notes and then letters ostensibly written to a neighbor in their comfortable London neighborhood the reader experiences Elizabeth’s struggle with existential meaninglessness and a descent into near madness as she explores her past and comes to grips with her present. This is a moving and sometimes very funny portrait of a very real and intelligent woman in the middle of her life, trying to create meaning and purpose as circumstances change.