Thank you to William Morrow, Book Club Girls and NetGalley for this ARC.

I wanted to like this book a lot, but it had such pacing problems that I never quite got into it. This book purports to be a dual timeline novel, yet Lucy's modern day storyline is so flat and only exists to serve the historical timeline. After reading all 400+ pages, I still don't understand why Lucy cared so much about this supposed secret.

Meanwhile, Nancy's storyline was much more interesting and engaging, but it too suffered from pacing problems. I was never sure of what her arc was supposed to be and felt myself get to the end and just threw my hands up and said "and?"

I am interested to learn more about Nancy Mitford, but I was disappointed by this attempted novelization of her life.

Thanks to the Book Club Girl Early Read program & NetGalley for a digital advance reader's copy. All comments and opinions are my own.

I am rating this novel at 3.5 stars as it promised more than it delivered, yet it checked my boxes for a good read: historical fiction about a London bookstore and a writer, with a present day mystery. Author Eliza Knight incorporated the real life bookstore, Heywood Hill Ltd, and acclaimed writer Nancy Mitford – one of 1930s London’s hottest socialites, authors, and a member of the scandalous Mitford sisters – in a dual-narrative story also featuring Lucy St. Clair, a fictional modern day American book curator looking for change in her life.

The oldest of six children of the notorious Mitford family (think Kardashians of the 1930s), Nancy is one of the 1920s’ Bright Young Things, who after 10 years of partying is now ready to marry and settle down. Current day Lucy is in London for two weeks, curating books for her American employer. The connection between the two women is the Heywood Hill bookshop in the heart of Mayfair, London, and a book Lucy owns, written by Nancy and inscribed to “Iris.”

Lucy also has a collection of letters written by Nancy, which she hopes will reveal who Iris is, as Nancy left the book in the bookshop for Iris, who never picked it up. Lucy’s recently deceased mother (and also a Nancy Mitford fan) purchased it years ago, along with the letters. The novel alternates between the two women and their time periods, with the majority of pages focusing on Nancy during the London war years. And I thought Nancy’s was the better story.

The Nancy chapters often begin with an excerpt from the real-life Nancy’s letters to friends like author Evelyn Waugh. What I found confusing is frequently the chapter began with a letter to someone, such as one of her sisters, but was crossed out and the rest of the chapter was her thoughts. Or the letter suddenly ended without conclusion as the rest of the chapter continued with Nancy’s first person narration. I would have liked an explanation from the author after the novel’s conclusion that explained why she chose to write the novel incorporating the letter format when the letters were very brief and Knight soon changed point of view from letter to interior monologue. On a positive note, I appreciated that while Nancy’s chapters were told in the first person, Lucy’s were in third person. Made it much easier to remember who the story was focusing on.

Nancy’s life is sad, as she is unhappily married to Peter Rodd. They are unable to have a child, and Peter is repeatedly unfaithful. On top of this, they are always in debt due to his overspending and under-employment. In addition to her heartache with Peter (who she nicknamed “Prod”) she feels responsible for two of her sisters’ misguided infatuations with Hitler and their support of the fascism that will soon lead to World War II.

One of the highlights of the book, and of Nancy’s life during this time, is her friendship with Sophie, a woman she meets while volunteering during the war. “Ours was a friendship born on the brink of war, and fed by comradery when our country was at its worst….Time again and again, friends have been my saving grace, the people who raise me up and motivate me to go on.”

In addition to the theme of friendship, the novel concludes with both Nancy and Lucy finding personal courage to pursue their own happiness. Lucy considers her efforts to locate the mysterious Iris. “Maybe it was meant to be my quest because I needed it. Without the search for Iris, and all the places it took me, I might never have discovered the things about myself I needed to learn to take my dreams into my own hands.” When the time came, Lucy had been the one to find the courage to pursue her own happiness – her own future – much like Nancy Mitford herself.

Enjoyable dual timeline historical fiction focused on author/socialite Nancy Mitford and her family, along with the Mayfair Bookshop where she worked for a time during World War II. I particularly liked Lucy's present-day story.

You don’t have to be well-versed in the goings on of The Mitford Sisters to be swept away by this particular novel. It is told in dual timelines; one in the late 1930’s featuring Nancy Mitford, a famous author of the time, and another in present day in England with Lucy, a book curator who is a fan of Nancy’s work. I love a good biographical fiction where I can immerse myself into a life and time I was unaware of. This story immediately drew me in and I could hardly put it down. Nancy was from a privileged family full of strong, independent women. Though she was flawed, her determination to find happiness despite all of the hardships she faced was admirable. I thought the use of the Bookshop to tie the two timelines together was brilliant. Lucy uses her time at the Bookshop to trace a name inscribed in a copy of an original Nancy Mitford book she was gifted. The search for the mysterious “Iris” kept me turning pages as I followed her trail of clues through both timelines. This is my favorite type of escapist read! Highly recommend for lovers of historical fiction and stories of fascinating women.

I enjoyed this dual-narrative historical fiction read. Both main characters, Nancy and Lucy, were intriguing. Nancy's life became incredibly fascinating - I found myself reading through the second half of the book, much faster than the first, as her story became increasingly unpredictable. The story of Lucy and her adventure in London, digging deeper into the history of Nancy, was a sweet addition to this story.

Thank you to HarperCollins Publishers and NetGalley for an ARC in exchange for my honest review.

Though I have really come to enjoy novels that present dual timelines, I would have preferred a more balanced approach in this book. The chapters for Nancy Mitford seemed to go on and on while those featuring the present day Lucy were disappointingly short. I also felt the conclusion tying the two together was a bit lacking. I was anticipating much more as that is the feature which makes a book memorable in my mind. However, I did see there were historical lessons we should be paying attention to, such as the way Hitler was able to poison the minds of seemingly intelligent people. Thanks to NetGalley and William Morrow for an advance copy to read and review.

I received an ARC of this book from NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.

I really enjoyed this book. I love books about bookstores and I've read a lot of them, and this one was one of my favorites!

So . . . . I've HEARD of the Mitford family, but really didn't know anything about any of them. And now, after reading this, I have added several Nancy Mitford books to my TBR list.

This is another dual storyline book, but the most interesting part of course is the life of Nancy Mitford. And what a life she had! Not all good - she had a lot of sorrow in her life. Although she was one of the Bright Young Things, and is known for her lively wit, literary salons and the Heywood Bookstore, she also lived through the Blitz, and many, many personal struggles. It did take me a bit to get into this novel, and then I thoroughly enjoyed it. And it made me want to know more, which is always good. Did Nancy actually THINK all the things this book says? who knows. But it turned out to be a very good read. Many thanks to the BookClub Girls, NetGalley, and William Morrow for the arc.

This book was a little slow for me. I am a mood reader so it might have just been me. I did enjoy the scenery and imagery and thought that the characters were very well developed. I thought the prose was also well done.

Wow, this is my hands down favorite historical novel this year! A dual timeline story depicting the story of one of the Mitford socialites and the famous bookstore associated with her.

This was a dual timeline story about Nancy Mitford and in present day-Lucy.It was just ok.It was an interesting premise but dragged in spots.

Eliza Knight brings together a brilliant dual-narrative story about Nancy Mitford—one of 1930s London’s hottest socialites, authors, and a member of the scandalous Mitford Sisters—and a modern American desperate for change, connected through time by a little London bookshop.

This story alternates between two timelines and it is engaging tale in trying times. Thank you to Netgalley, the author, and the publisher for an early copy in exchange for a honest review.

Nancy Mitford, in 1930s London, is one of the Bright Young Things, along with Evelyn Waugh and other socialites. Like Waugh, she’s a writer. The book follows her, her family, and her friends through WWII and beyond. I’ll be honest, I didn’t like Nancy at first, when she’s shallow and bent on having fun, but she definitely grew on me as the book progressed. She’s an intelligent and determined woman, facing difficult situations and overcoming them. She always tries to do the right thing. During the war, she works at the Mayfair bookshop, Heywood Hill, while also working for the Air Raid Precautions.

Lucy St. Clair is a private library curator. She designs and stocks libraries for the well-to-do. She’s on special assignment in London, hoping to find first editions and rare books for one of her stateside libraries. She (and her mother while she was alive) is a huge Nancy Mitford fan. While in London working, she hopes to track down the person to whom Nancy inscribed one of her novels. While it took me a while to come around to liking Nancy, I instantly adored Lucy.

Nancy and Lucy have things in common. Nancy was always helping, be it her sisters or for the war effort. She never shied away from doing what had to be done. Lucy is also a hard worker. She’s determined and kind. Both are exceedingly courageous.

I had never heard of Nancy Mitford before reading this book, but I’ll need to hunt down The Pursuit of Love one of these days. Her family was interesting, her mother and sisters strong supporters of Adolph Hitler, living in Berlin and befriending the Führer. Her father stands wholly against him and a staunch supporter of Britain. This books follows Nancy as she agonizes over her family, does everything to help Britain, meets the men who will become important in her life, and deals with a philandering husband.

This was an interesting and informative book. Told in alternating times and chapters, it read easily and moved along. I’ll be happy to read another book by this author.

I received an advanced reader copy of this book from the publisher through NetGalley. I thank all involved for their generosity in allowing me to read this book, but it had no effect on this review. All opinions in this review reflect my true and honest reactions to reading this book.

I enjoyed this book. Many of the characters were strong and likable. Nancy continued on even through family and personal disappointments.

This is an entertaining story about a book curator from present day US who travels to the UK to research her favorite author from WWII London.
The author's life is revealed in a series of letters that she wrote during the time.
The curator finds the answers she is looking for as well as a new life in the UK.

I received The Mayfair Bookshop as part of a NetGalley giveaway.

In the present day, Lucy is an American rare books curator traveling to London on business. There she is based at a bookstore where Nancy Mitford worked two generations earlier. This is particularly exciting to Lucy,who also also brings with her a personal, Mitford-related mystery. As she tries to discover the mystery of Nancy's mysterious correspondent "Iris," we experience Nancy's wartime experience: her loveless marriage, her troubled family, her wartime activism, her creative output, and her dreams for the future.

I enjoyed this. I'm only fleetingly familiar with the Mitford sisters, their eclectic upbringing, and their wildly divergent paths in adulthood., but they're a fascinating family that ran the spectrum between wealth and poverty, good and evil,, loving and estranged. They're a more famous, and probably more extreme, example of the complexities that all families contain, particularly in our own era of political division.

This is my first Eliza Knight book and I enjoyed it immensely!!!!!!! Love her writing style and especially this particular story. The love of books and bookstores was all in this one and that's right up a booklovers alley.

The title of the Mayfair bookshop is a little miss leading. The story is a fictional biography of famed author Nancy Mitford, but it has little to do with the bookshop she worked in.

I’ve read other stories about Nancy and know that she is a fascinating lady, yet I found that she came across as flat and meek in this version of her life.

The Mitford family seem to be enjoying a renaissance on TV and in books. There was a recent miniseries with Lily James and, not long ago, I read both The Bookseller’s Secret and the latest entry in Jessica Fellows’ historical mystery series that features Nancy and her siblings.

For anyone who may not know, the Mitford daughters were fascinating and so different from each other. Diana left her husband, a Guinness heir, to be with the Fascist, Oswald Moseley. Unity was enamored of Hitler. Nancy was an author and there were also, Jessica and Deborah.

Happily I did not suffer from Mitford fatigue and I thoroughly enjoyed Eliza Knight’s novel. As is popular now, there are two timelines. In the present, Lucy is a book curator from Washington DC who is spending time in England. She is fascinated with the Heywood Hill bookshop where Nancy Mitford once worked. Lucy also has a connection to someone Nancy almost married.

Lucy is a huge Mitford fan. She possesses some Mitford letters and her mother, who is no longer alive, had a valuable edition of one of Nancy’s novels.

While in England, Lucy visits the Mitford home. This is beautifully described and made me long to see the real location. Lucy’s quest is to discern who the Iris in a dedication in one of Nancy’s novels is.

In the historical timeline, Hitler is on the horizon. As noted above, some of the sisters are not pro democracy. Nancy does attend a rally at Diana’s urging although she is clearly not a “Black Shirt.”

Readers get to know Nancy well. They vicariously see her pre-marriage lifestyle in the smart set. Readers watch Nancy in love with the ensuing disappointment, marriage and compromise. They also witness Nancy writing her novels, working at the bookstore and trying to support herself (husband Peter does not do well in the work world).

I very much enjoyed my time at The Mayfair Bookshop. I recommend this novel to those who enjoy historical novels and/or women’s fiction.

Many thanks to NetGalley and William Morrow/Custom House for this title. All opinions are my own.

Pub date: 12 April 2022

Book Review Book: The Mayfair Bookshop: A Novel of Nancy Milford and the Pursuit of Happiness
Author: Eliza Knight
ASIN: B0995Y5YHM
Publisher: HarperCollins
Page Length: 426
Overall Rating: 5/5 stars
Blog Rating: 5 Saltire Flags

1931-Nancy
2022-Lucy
Heywood Hill Bookstore , Mayfair Region of London

This is the story of two women, Nancy Mitford and Lucy St. Clair, with two timelines. Nancy is from the past in the twentieth century, as Lucy is in the present time, in the twenty-first century. Both timelines are set in England and centered around the famous Heywood Hill bookstore on Curzon Street in the Mayfair District of London.

The story from the past is about the tragic life of Nancy Mitford, the beautiful socialite and famous author that some considered to be a a bit of a snob and others thought she was so clever, cheeky and witty! Nancy’s siblings were Pamela, Thomas, Diana, Unity, Jessica, and Deborah. All having extremely different personalities and opposite views on politics which caused separation and heartaches for Nancy. Her sisters Diana and Unity were nazi sympathizers idolizing a devil! Diana married famous fascist leader Oswald Mosley, even Nancy Mitford’s mother was a fascist to a degree, as she idolized Hitler which did not strengthen her marriage to her husband! Her husband despised Hitler and the Nazi regime and everything they stood for! Like Nancy, he backed his country in Great Britain, both their government and political views. He also thought Hitler was a monster and was ashamed of his two fascist daughters and their cruel and racist views! Nancy Mitford hated Hitler with every fiber in her being, for brain-washing her sisters, his dictatorship, that led to the destruction, slaughter, and demonic treatment of the Jewish people. They were sent to to concentration camps in places like Auschwitz, a place that had three camps a prison camp, a slave-labour camp and an extermination camp. This also included gay and other ethnic groups like the French, which included people who hid and assisted the Jewish people in helping them escape. Nancy and her sisters were once considered the bright young things by the tabloids in the 1920’s. This was before the Second World War, which was on the horizon, when everything changed for the Mitford family! Furthermore, in the 1930’s the Nazi regime and Adolph Hitler were trying to get followers to to dehumanize and eventually murder the Jewish people! It only got worse later in the 1930’s which led to World War II and the senseless murder and torture of the Jewish people which led to the Holocaust.

In this phenomenal read it first shows how Nancy becomes very infatuated with Hamish St. Clair-Erskine and her first novel “Highland Fling” main character was based about him after their broken engagement. She wasted five years on a man who was completely dishonest about who he really was with lies and deception. It absolutely destroyed Nancy which had been so cruel and unkind. Understanding it was the twentieth century where such men had to be discreet since it was illegal, but he could have shared this secret privately with Nancy who would never had put Hamish in such dangerous position. Instead he just ripped her fragile heart out withholding the truth from her Then she marries Peter Rodd her broke, cheating, drunkard, husband, but the most heartbreaking is that she wanted to become a mother so badly, but wasn’t able to achieve it. I think her safe place that kept her sane was the Heywood Hill Bookstore and trying to discover her own happiness. It also shows her friendships, lovers and more through letters with several close friends including the owners of the bookstore, George Heywood Hill and Lady Anne Gathorne-Hardy who he later marries, plus she become friends with many famous novelists and others including the mysterious Iris.

Bibliophile, Lucy St. Clair is an American book curator from Washington D.C.who is grieving the loss of her her mother. She gets a rare job opportunity which will take her temporarily to her dream job in London at the famous Heywood Hill bookstore. It will help her get promoted in her DC job and help her focus on something other than her recent loss. Lucy,had previously discovered she was distantly related to Hamish St Claire-Erskine, Nancy’s first love. Nancy Mitford and her families history has always fascinated Lucy and her mother. She is also trying to find information about an inscription she and her mother had discovered to a woman named Iris, but keeps coming to a dead end. During this time she also meets an extremely charming man from Scotland and like herself a fellow bibliophile named Gavin. A man who opens her heart, plus making so many new friends and colleagues through the bookstore, even her boss Oliver is fantastic and doing a job she absolutely loves! A job she never wants to leave but she knows even if she had gotten a permanent job opportunity how could she leave her sister, friends in the states? Furthermore, she was pretty sure she is going to get the the job promotion she has been working diligently to accomplish. As both women in both of the past and present times are in a way searching for the same think thing-the pursuit of happiness. Do they find it? Read this literary masterpiece and find out !

Eliza Knight is an author I have been reading is her Scottish historical romance books since 2010 when she was a new author. This is my first historical fiction novel I ever read by Ms, Knight that I absolutely loved! It weaves two times and is a dual-narrative about Nancy Mitford and her scandalous family including her two fascist sisters connected to Adolph Hitler. On the Mitford side of this book, this author did a wonderful research getting so much true information about Nancy and her family. Now Lucy St. Clair, the fictional character in the current time was so also much fun to read about-working her temporary dream job in London. A place she would like to stay forever! This story is also surrounded in letters, by a mystery with an inscription to woman named Iris. Lucy is trying to to find out who it is, as there are several names and things connected to this name. Both women’s lives are set around the Heywood Hill bookstore which is in the Mayfair region of London and both are looking for the pursuit of happiness.A book I can’t recommend enough!

I think this is one of my favorite reads of the year! Definitely a book readers don’t want to the miss!

Disclaimer: I received a complimentary copy and an advance reader copy from the HarperCollins publishers. I voluntarily agreed to do a fair review and blog through netgalley. All thoughts, ideas and words are my own.

Buy Links:
Harpercollins: https://bit.ly/TheMayfairBookshop
Amazon Print: https://bit.ly/MayfairBookshop
Amazon Ebook: https://bit.ly/TheMayfairBookshop_Ebook
Barnes & Noble: https://bit.ly/TheMayfairBookshop_BN
Kobo: https://bit.ly/TheMayfairBookshop_Kobo
Apple: https://apple.co/3AhR8fV