Uncle Paul is a 1950’s suspense novel about a horrible summer holiday, suffered by three sisters. Isabel is struggling in a seaside caravan with two small boys and (intermittently) a rather strict new husband. Mildred is staying in a nearby clifftop cottage where she honeymooned years ago with her first husband Paul and is not enjoying the eerie atmosphere and lack of creature comforts. Their capable younger sister Meg is summoned from London by telegram to resolve all their problems and manage things, but is there more to the situation than meets the eye? Is Mildred just being silly or is there a real sinister threat hanging over the holiday?

There’s a good cast of supporting characters in this book - I particularly liked Cedric, the annoying know-it-all child who kept contradicting the adult characters. There are plenty of laughs along with a suspenseful plot.

A fun book for those who like Golden Age crime fiction and similar novels.

I am a huge lover of crime stories and this one didn’t disappoint. It is the first book by Celia Fremlin that I have read and I will certainly be reading more by her.
Set in 1959 it follows a summer by the seaside where Meg has been summoned by her sister Isabel who is worried about their older sister Mildred whose husband, Uncle Paul, is due to be released from prison. Uncle Paul could very well be seeking revenge as Mildred shopped him to the police when she found that he was already married and had attempted to kill his first wife fifteen years before.
The tension slowly builds throughout the book and the twist at the end took me by surprise. I found myself getting drawn in by the various characters, some funny, some endearing and some downright annoying.
An interesting book which I found most enjoyable.

This was a great 50's crime fiction! I hadn't read any of Fremlin's and she's a good discovery. It keeps you on your toes, and certainly it can be considered a domestic thriller, great to put you in the mood for Summer!

Seemingly Innocuous..
Family skeletons emerge from a dark and dubious cupboard during a seemingly innocuous Summer holiday in the 1950,s. Beautifully drawn and, perhaps, unexpectedly menacing, this is cleverly constructed slow burn suspense with a keenly observed and heavily claustrophobic setting, perfectly executed plotting and a deftly drawn cast of eclectic characters. The sinister meets the seemingly serene and the wry wit surprises against the darkness. Perfection.

Despite having only read three Celia Fremlin books before this one, I am a huge admirer of her work. Accurately dubbed the grandmother of British psycho-domestic noir, it's obvious why so many readers are rediscovering her work. Well done Faber for reissuing her books.

Uncle Paul is about three sisters: Meg is asked to come and help her sister Isabel who is on holiday. Mildred, their difficult half-sister, has returned to a nearby coastal cottage where her husband, the mysterious Uncle Paul, was arrested for her attempted murder. Due to be released from prison, the sisters start to wonder whether he'll come back to wreak his revenge.

This is great. The skewed family dynamic, the overwrought sisters, the caravan, the creepy cottage, the politics of the seaside hotel, the classic British holiday resort and an assortment of well drawn characters, and, of course, the darkness hovering on the edge of things. I really enjoyed it. The denouement is clever and satisfying.

Celia Fremlin's great gift is to make events simultaneously creepy and ridiculous as her characters vascilate between the two positions causing the reader to experience something similar.

If you haven't discovered Celia Fremlin's writing, what are you waiting for? If you have, you'll doubtless want to read this one.

In "Uncle Paul", three sisters are expecting the return of a certain uncle Paul. While they are vacationing at the seaside, nothing is what is seems and everyone suddenly behaves suspicously. There is a clear sense of foreboding in this novel, aided by the flashforwards.

A perfect summer read! Feeling goosebumps all over my body during blazing hot afternoons is a new and exciting feeling for me. I did expect a plot twist, but not this one. All in all, I have to admit that this book gave me major "Waiting for Godot" vibes.

Celia Fremlin is a massively underrated, in my view, writer of what we might now call domestic noir. I read a lot of her tense, claustrophobic novels in my 20s (mostly yellow hardbacks from the library) and I'm a big fan - it's great to see them being reissued.

Uncle Paul, published in 1959, was her second novel, after perhaps her best known work, the classic The Hours Before Dawn. It's about sisters Meg and Isabel and their older half-sister Mildred, an ill-advised holiday, and the long shadow cast by the eponymous "Uncle Paul". (The Long Shadow is in fact the title of another book by Fremlin.)

Celia Fremlin was a keen and witty observer of people and relationships, which evidently haven't changed much since this book was published over 60 years ago, because there's lots to recognise here. The over-anxious sister, constantly making everything worse than it needs to be; the know-it-all child; the commitment-phobic (possibly) but entertaining boyfriend. She's really strong on characterisation and dialogue - which always rings true - and often made me laugh with insights and turns of phrase.

'"Though he was dark all right. Very dark. And about the right size, too, I should say." She stared at Isabel speculatively, as if one could assess the exact size of a husband by a sufficiently careful study of his wife.'

I suppose not a lot actually happens for quite a while (although there's something very sinister about that looming yellow wardrobe). One incident made me catch my breath in shock, and I had no idea how the whole thing would end. But it's the way the story is told that makes it such a delight and made me want to go back and immediately reread Fremlin's entire catalogue.

An odd little suspense novel from the fifties, recently reprinted. Apparently Fremlin was called “the grandmother of psycho-domestic noir” and “the British Patricia Highsmith”, but she reminded me most of Ethel Lina White and her slightly gothic thrillers, for example Wax works. Fremlin’s thriller is not so much about plot as about fear itself, and the stories we tell ourselves.

The story centers around three half-sisters: young, capable Meg, harried housewife Isabel, and oldest, rich sister Mildred. The (frankly not very believable) set-up is this: fifteen years ago, when Meg was only six, Mildred married a man, Uncle Paul, after a very short acquaintance. In her honeymoon cottage, she finds out that he’s using a fake name, that he’s a bigamist, wanted by the police for having tried to kill his first wife and is probably plotting to kill Mildred for her money. She turns him in and he’s sentenced to twenty years in prison, but is now due to be released, and Mildred is certain that he’s out for revenge.

The story takes place by the seaside. Isabel has rented a caravan for the holidays to stay in with her two sons and her second, newly married husband, just out of the army. Mildred has rented a cottage in the same area (we soon find out that it’s actually The Cottage). And Meg is roped in to stay at the seaside by a frantic phone call from Isabel, begging for her assistance. The atmosphere is one of creepy paranoia, as they all await Uncle Paul and get on each other’s nerves. Odd, unexplained, jarring small things happens, and Meg is trying to keep her calm and find out what is really going on.

Some parts of this novel was very interesting to me. Apparently, it was usual at the time to rent a run-down caravan by the sea for the holidays, and I really enjoyed exploring that snapshot of fifties Britain. Both Isabel and Mildred are horribly annoying - Isabel is a put-upon, whiny, ineffectual fuss-pot and Mildred a spoiled, selfish narcissist, and I couldn’t help laughing at their interactions with Meg. There is also two unbearable children who provides plenty of comic relief with their complete disregard for their parents. Meg has a sweet romance of sorts, with a man who *maybe* could be Uncle Paul. The marriages of Isabel and Mildred are not happy - Isabel’s husband is intimated to be hard and strict, and Mildred’s husband is mostly absent, and Meg ponders quite a lot what marriage might do to a woman.

In the end, though, I felt let down by the mystery part. Fremlin builds up tension over and over again, and then pricks the bubble. There are long stretches when nothing much happens but paranoiac inner monologues. When something sinister actually does happen, it’s often not very credible. (A cobra? Really?) At the same time, Fremlin does evoke unease in the reader and builds the story in a very skillful way. And finally, something serious happens, which explains all those little mysteries. There is a fabulous twist unveiling which I didn’t care that much for, but which is very much in the spirit of the domestic crime novels of the time.

All in all, a solid three-star read.

I received an advance reading copy from netgalley in exchange for an honest review.

I think Celia Fremlin is an excellent, and very under-appreciated author. She seems largely unknown, but maybe this will be another hit for Faber, and bring her some of the recognition she deserves. I must admit however, that this was my least favourite of the few books I've read by her; The Hours Before Dawn is the best one I've read so far, and I plan to read more sooner rather than later.

In this one, Meg, who is the youngest but most sensible of three sisters is summoned to a seaside resort by Isobel, who is worried about their older sister Mildred. Years ago, Mildred was on honeymoon at the same resort with her husband, the eponymous Uncle Paul, when she discovered that he had attempted to murder his first wife. Mildred betrayed him to the police, and now he is due to be released and may be seeking revenge By coincidence, Mildred is staying in the same cottage they honeymooners in all those years ago. The tension managed to build almost imperceptibly as the characters go about their seaside holiday with trip to the beach, fairground and hotels, all the whole the sisters start to worry about the people they are spending time with, could one of them be Uncle Paul in disguise? Reading it, I had a growing sense of unease, and the ending took me completely by surprise.

*Many thanks to Netgalley and Faber and Faber for a review copy of this book in exchange for an honest opinion.*

Well I loved this. I'd read a review saying it was old fashioned and dated but I didn't find it so at all, certainly no more so than any mid century Agatha Christie. There's maybe one or two references to women being hysterical or not being able to "hang onto" a man (rather than the man simply being a womanizer) but they are few and far between.

What you do get is the story of three sisters- Mildred who has returned to stay at a cottage she once rented with her husband (the eponymous Uncle Paul) who, it turned out, had murdered his first wife. Next we have Isabel who seems to get overwrought at the drop of a hat because she senses her husband may not love her and their two boys quite as much as she'd like him to. Finally we have Meg, sensible to the core (except perhaps when it comes to her love life as she has settled on the feckless Freddy for a lover).

The story follows a call from Isabel to Meg begging her to come and talk sense into Mildred who is intent on staying in the same cottage where Uncle Paul was arrested fifteen years before. Both Mildred and Isabel seem to think that Paul is now out of prison and coming for revenge on one or all of the sisters who caused his incarceration.

What follows is a wonderfully slow burn thriller with the tension ratcheting up by degrees until everyone is at screaming pitch.

Excellent book. Highly recommended for anyone who loves a Christie or a psychological slow burn thriller.

Thanks to Netgalley for the ARC.

This book was originally published in 1959 and I'm so glad Faber & Faber are republishing it. It's a real gem. Set in a rainy British seaside resort, where Meg has been summoned to deal with her older sister Mildred, it is extraordinary on many levels.
Firstly, the pacing. Many books nowadays keep you hanging on until the bitter end for some key facts about what's actually happening. In Uncle Paul, Celia Fremlin gives us enough satisfying nuggets in the first chapter or two to keep us utterly agog.
We learn that "Uncle Paul" was something to Mildred, that there was police involvement, and she wouldn't want to relive all the unpleasant publicity again. My mind instantly turned to Mildred being abducted, or abused. What actually happened to her was something that was a crime more often reported on in the 50s.
Secondly, there are family dynamics. Meg is quite a lot younger than her step sister Mildred, with Isabel in the middle, and she observes with exasperation Isabel's constant panicking over her strict ex-army husband coming home unexpectedly and finding the holiday caravan in a mess. Mildred, meanwhile, is one of those women who suffer from her nerves: she's constantly fraught.
The book is laugh out loud funny, particularly with regards to the residents of the seaside hotel, who seem to band together, and their secret relief when the weather turns cloudy and they can stay inside.
But it also has some observations of the crushing disappointment that life can bring for women, and the loss of youth.
"Mildred is face to face, like many a woman before her, with the terrible realisation that the attributes of her youth are gone. For years a woman may tell herself that she is still at heart the same lively, courageous, generous girl that she always was. It is merely that, just at this moment, she is too depressed to be lively; too ill-used to be generous; and prudence, not courage, happens to be appropriate on this particular occasion.
And then, one day., she wakes up and knows that these feelings, these qualities, are not merely in abeyance, but gone for ever."
An absolute delight.

Very dated, with unrealistic, unsympathetic and unappealing characters.

Storyline not really credible either