This is the first novel I have read by this author and I loved it. With shades of Mckewan’s Atonement, it hooked me immediately with its deft exploration of human relationships.

Frances has spent most of her adult life nursing her mother and after her death is employed to research and report on the architecture of a dilapidated English stately home owned by Mr Lieberman it’s new American owner. Shorty after her arrival Peter and Cara arrive. Peter has been employed to report back on the building and the value of its contents. Frances becomes obsessed with the couple who live in the rooms below her attic room. Frances has always been a loner but can’t stop herself taking the bait of their offer of friendship. As their lives become more and more entwined secrets start to unravel as does Frances. Secrets and lies are at the heart of this novel with an unexpected twist of an ending. This is a dark, haunting tale full of suspense and I couldn’t put it down! I received a free copy of this book from Penguin Books in exchange for an honest review. A favourable review was not required and all opinions expressed here are my own.

When we see people from afar we can always imagine their lives being ideal or a disaster. It's not until we take a closer look that we realise the truth, whatever that might be. Claire Fuller in all of her novels (three thus far) explores this idea at the core. This, her third novel, is a masterfully executed idea on the subject. Though there have been many books in the past with the same premise, a triad of characters, you cannot help yourself but feel the walls of the house where the story takes place, smell the scents of the foods and enjoy or be appalled by the reality of the characters.

Well this was really different and I say that in a good way. I’ve read one previously by this author and was really refreshing to find a new style, new plot, nothing predictable at all.

Frances, a nearly 40 year old woman who’s led a very sheltered life looking after her frail mother takes a month long job in a very old country house / stately home. There she meets Cara and Peter, also working at the house for a while. Their lives seem fascinating and glamorous to Frances and they quickly take her under their wing.... with what may be devastating consequences. Told in the present day and the past this is a great mystery. Reminds me of Fran Coopers Two houses. Creepy and dark and compelling.

I’m a real fan of Claire Fuller’s books, and her latest did not disappoint. With simmering undertones of love, jealousy and secrets, I couldn’t put Bitter Orange down. Frances (Franny) narrates the book from both her death bed and memories of her time at Lyntons, a decaying country house where she is employed to make an inventory of its architectural features. It is there she meets Peter and the troubled Cara and the story of their summer together begins. There was a twist about two thirds of the way through that was brilliant and had me gulping through the remaining pages into the early hours. I can’t wait to see what Claire writes next! Thanks to Netgalley for an ARC of this book.

Claire Fuller is an amazing writer. This novel had tinges of Atonement, Beguiled and novels like that with one single lonely manor house and the study of those within. It gave me frissons during it and I didn’t know why exactly, as if that’s kind of books. What is going on, who is Cara really and why do they want Frances in their lives? Why is Frances so socially awkward and looking through the hole in the floor looking for clues into a another world.
There’s a lot of soul-searching and thinking inwardly, strange walks in the woods, creepy statues in the gardens and those Palladian bridges...well they do sound nice.
I just wasn’t wholly convinced of the characters and the reveal in the story overall. it was a lovely atmospheric novel however and the decay, the sense of wrong, the whole atmosphere, those bitter oranges really did sum up the novel well - it might be a beautiful fruit now, but bite it and taste the bitterness, then wait for the rot to set in.

It’s a beguiling read however and I was enchanted by the whole thing.

I like Claire Fuller's work very much and Bitter Orange is a beautifully written novel of repression, loneliness, guilt and the quest for redemption. It is good but I did have my reservations.

The book is told in the first person and set mainly in 1969 as an old and dying woman, Frances Jellico, recalls that time. It is the story of how Frances, newly released from an all-consuming carer's role looking after her cruel and critical mother takes a job cataloguing some of the contents of a derelict country house. An eccentric and rather bohemian couple are also working there and the stories of the three of them emerge as the summer progresses and Frances begins to experience new aspects of life.

It is very well done. Fuller writes beautifully and again inhabits the mind of a thoughtfully and richly portrayed female narrator. She creates a fine atmosphere of decay and a sense of impending catastrophe along with a wholly convincing sense of place, so the whole thing is very readable. However, I wasn't always convinced by Frances's actions, the "twist" didn't come as much of a surprise and overall I wasn't sure Bitter Orange had said much new to me.

I did enjoy Bitter Orange, but didn't quite grab me in the same way as the outstanding Our Endless Numbered Days and the very good Swimming Lessons. Claire Fuller is a very fine writer and I can still recommend this, but with a slight note of reservation.

(My thanks to Penguin Books for an ARC via NetGalley.)

A beautifully written, multi layered novel, brimming with cleverly chosen imagery and highly atmospheric prose. This dark and haunting tale was an utterly compulsive read. Superb.

Bitter Orange is a novel about loneliness, lies, and one summer in an old house. Frances spent years as the carer of her mother, but once her mother was gone, she was a lonely woman looking for purpose. A job surveying the gardens of a dilapidated house for its American owner was an opportunity to do something different, but it becomes even stranger than she expected as she befriends Cara and Peter, the couple living beneath her in the house as Peter looks at the contents of the house. Soon, they are languishing about the place and telling stories, but lies and obsession start to surface.

The novel is written in a readable style and the narrative is suspenseful and carefully paced to give a sense of the summer, but also to give the reader a sense of unreliability, remembrance, and withheld information. From its summary, Bitter Orange may sound similar to a lot of novels set in the twentieth-century; what distinguishes it as different is the way that Frances is presented, both by herself as the narrator and through the way she tells the story. The story itself is quite simple, with ambiguity at times taking the place of revelation to match the focus on lies and storytelling.

Bitter Orange has the atmosphere and feel of a novel written much closer to the 1969 setting of the summer Frances spends in the house, and unfolds a story that is simple yet complex in its telling. It grew on me as a reading experience: it takes time to realise that it is not a story about revelation, but one about how stories are told and how people really feel underneath.

An intriguing book of past and present, guilt and atonement, and the way we tell stories to recreate the world and our selves as we’d like them to be.

Fuller writes fluid, fluent prose and though some of her symbolic imagery is a tad heavy handed (those bitter oranges that glow with promise but which are acidic within, the trompe l’oeil décor, the repeated use of the word ‘penance’), she winds it through her story to some effect.

We’re probably used to the fictional relationship triangle and this one between bright, charismatic but volatile and troubled Cara, staid but naïve Frances and the charming yet enigmatic Peter doesn’t break the mould – it reminded me constantly of the triangle in Sophie’s Choice (but without the Holocaust backstory, of course).

I did think that the ‘secrets’ were fairly obvious to anyone who reads extensively – and the ‘twist’ at about 80% had me groaning aloud! Why is it that a book can’t be a book, seemingly, without a twist somewhere these days? – it feels a bit crude here, to tell the truth.

So some nicely controlled writing and a genuinely gripping, page-turning narrative - atmospheric and satisfying.

The book begins in what appears to be an elderly lady's bedroom in a care home, with flashbacks to the summer of 1969: Socially awkward Frances undertakes a job cataloguing garden structures at an old and dilapidated house for the absent American owner. Unknown to her, others are also in the house - Peter, who has been commissioned with surveying the house itself, and Cara, his much younger girlfriend/partner. Much to Frances' surprise, they befriend her and make her part of their life. Cara takes Frances into her confidence, telling her tales of her background, but something is not right. Frances misinterprets Peter's friendship and falls in love with him.
As the story develops, so does the intrigue - is Cara all that she seems? What is Frances hiding? What is the true back story of the three main characters?
Although a compelling read, the ending was a little predictable (I had worked it out about three-quarters of the way through the book, but kept reading to check that I was right) and the storyline was at times reminiscent of other novels.