I’m certain there’s no shortage of books that examine the intricacies of a friendship over decades. Friendships can be tested at various junctures in a person’s life, particularly when people choose partners, become parents, experience successes or failures, or if there is significant financial inequity. The challenge in writing a novel about such events and the impact of these on the friendship, is that the compressed timeline can render events overly dramatic.

Another danger in the friendship story is that it becomes one-sided. Invariably, one friend has all the luck while the other has only misfortune.

Somehow Nina Stibbe sidesteps the pitfalls, and in One Day I Shall Astonish the World she has created an authentic story that captures the see-sawing of Susan and Norma’s friendship over many decades. Continue reading →