Meanwhile, the portrayals of the other guests are positively – delightfully – cruel, especially the overbearing, over-monied Mrs Pusey and her curiously devoted daughter who decide to make cheering Edith up their project. 'As far as guests were concerned, it took a perverse pride in its very absence of attractions, so that any visitor mildly looking for a room would be puzzled and deflected by the sparseness of the terrace, the muted hush of the lobby … There was no sauna, no hairdresser and certainly no glass cases displaying items of jewellery the bar was small and dark and its austerity did not encourage people to linger.' This pathetic fallacy is wonderfully handled, and the descriptions of the quiet, snooty hotel, where one imagines the air is almost as heavy as the old-fashioned furniture, are as evocative as they are amusing: She has been forced into temporary exile in the 'stolid' Swiss hotel of the book's title after a romantic indiscretion that has outraged her friends so much that they have ordered her away to have a good long think.Īt first, Edith does indeed mope around, failing to write her latest blousy novel, trying to decide how she should make her way through life and soaking up and reflecting back the melancholy atmosphere of her surroundings. Written in clean and simple, but also subtly suggestive, prose it tells of Edith Hope, a romantic novelist on a 'curious interlude in her life'. It is actually one that should be admired and enjoyed. The sense of outraged justice created by the perception that Hotel du Lac usurped Ballard's crown is unfortunate. Both from the point of view that Empire Of The Sun is so very good, but also because of the anger her victory provoked. The New Statesman said it was 'pretentious' although did at least do Brookner the kindness of noting that 'it wasn't her fault that she won the prize.' The author herself half-apologised that her books are 'quite nice but unimportant' and suggested it might have been better if Empire Of The Sun had won in its place. Malcolm Bradbury called her winning novel, Hotel du Lac, 'parochial', and thundered that it was not the sort of book that should have won the Booker. Even at the time it annoyed plenty of critics and Anita Brookner, the writer lucky-unlucky enough to be chosen in his place, took a lot of stick. A quarter-century on, this failure to reward greatness seems a travesty. Not – most notably – for Empire Of The Sun. One of the strange anomalies in the Booker's long and (reasonably) exalted history is the fact that JG Ballard never won it.

Hotel Du Lac by Anita Brookner