Like a Greek tragedy, we could tell from the beginning that there wasn’t to be a simple and unadulterated happy ending for any of the characters of this novel. When the 20-something son of an old friend comes round for dinner, housewife and mother-of-two Phyllis realises that she’s bored with her comfortable, predictable middle-class life on the outskirts of London. She obsesses over and romanticises the young man whose initial Hemingway-esque appeal of anti-bourgeois intellectualism and decadent poverty becomes rather diluted the more we learn about him.

Stuck for meaning, Phyllis attempts to find it in youth, as though in proximity to the young, she herself can discover something new. Her teenage daughter Collette begins to attempt the same technique, but meets equal levels of failure despite her own unequivocal youth. Phyllis is trying to discover some lost potential, but for Collette, potential is not enough. This is perhaps due to the swinging sixties era in which the events are set (which the title of the book of course makes reference to), where a new social and sexual permissiveness made everyone feel that there was something they were missing out on if they weren’t grabbing at a new life with both hands.

A fun twist towards the end of the book reveals however that not everything is as it seems, that even the quietest and most seemingly conventional of people can have their secrets.

Thank you to Net Galley and Penguin Random House for a ARC of this book.

i'm afraid i find the storytelling to be a bit dry and i can't quite bring myself to care about what i am reading which is a pity as the writing is far from bad

Phyllis throws caution to the winds and leaves her buttoned-up marriage for sexual pleasure and her authentic self. Reading this book is a good reminder that The Swinging Sixties only happened for a few people, mostly in cities and only started in 1966. It is also noteworthy that it's easy for Phyllis to do this as she is white and well off. Free love is easier if you can afford it.

A touch of the Mrs Robinson’s about this. Set in 1967 and a suburban tale of what it might have been like ic you were rich and white. Interesting but ever so slightly teeth grindingly predicable.

'Free Love' by Tessa Hadley is a wondrously evocative tale of love and life in Sixties Britain, told with consummate skill by a brilliant author. Phyllis, a repressed housewife and mother, embarks on a secret affair with a much younger man, Nicholas, a friend of the family -a tawdry family that has devastating effect on everyone concerned. What begins as a conventional story of a suburban family, becomes a tale that mirrors the changing society of Britain in the 1960s. A dryly funny, cleverly acerbic book, beautifully written.

I massively enjoyed this. It had a Richard Yates vibe, a kind of suburban Americana setting and style but British, which really worked for me - also reminded me of a kind of more literary Mavis Cheek (whom I love). The plot truly pulled me along and the twist genuinely knocked me off my feet - did not see it coming! A subtle and moving ending, bringing some realism to what could have been a fantastic tale. Loved it - a new favourite. Highly recommended.

There is a haunting quality to this novel of a family in the 60s London. Phyllis Fischer is a wife and mother who begins an affair with a much younger man which sees her move out of the comfortable family home to a squat to try to make a new life.

This is a novel of life changes but not necessarily transformation, in an changing England, still feeling the impact of economic and social policies of the 40s and 50s. The author captures the dreariness of the time but also beautifully captured descriptions of gardens and parks which reinforces that slow transformation of the characters.

Tessa Hadley is an author whose work I’ve wanted to read for a while. Her writing is crisp and literary, quite modern but sort of classic at the same time. I was offered the opportunity to read a copy of her latest book Free Love by the publishers and I’m glad I did.

The story opens in suburban London in the late 1960s, a time of social and sexual revolution. Phyllis Fischer, a pretty and dutiful housewife and mother of two, finds her life upended when a young twenty-something family friend comes to their home for dinner.

If a bourgeois housewife’s sexual and intellectual awakening in the 1960s sounds like a tale that’s been told before (there are parallels with Madame Bovary which I’m also reading at the moment), this has much more to offer.

The writing is sharp, stylish and immersive, and as the plot unfolds, it takes an unexpected turn and had me completely absorbed. The omniscient narration means we get insights into the state of mind of several of the characters, making it all the more fascinating.

Hadley poses interesting questions around what it means to be fulfilled as a woman, the limitations of motherhood, authenticity in terms of beliefs, and the cost of finding contentment - Ferrante-type themes explored in what might be described as a more understated and quintessentially English way.

Free Love has been touted as a potential for the @womensprize longlist which will be announced tomorrow. I’d be happy to see it on there and I’ll definitely read more of her work. 3.5-4/5 ⭐️

*I read a digital copy of this book courtesy of the publishers @randomhouse @vintagebooks via @netgalley. As always, this is an honest review.*

Tessa Hadley is a clever writer who gets deep into the hearts of her characters (well, the female ones at least). She writes extremely well – this is literary fiction, not chick lit (not that I have anything against chick lit, mind you, I’m just putting this in its appropriate box).

Free Love tells the story of Phyllis, a bored 1960s housewife who becomes infatuated with a much younger man, Nicholas. She gives up her whole life (and kids) in order to be with him. The effect on her daughter, in particular, is profound.

The novel is mostly unjudgmental about Phyllis, or indeed the other characters. It doesn’t moralise, doesn’t condemn. But it doesn’t shy from showing the damage Phyllis inflicts on her family either. It may be Free Love, but it’s not free of consequences.

Nicholas comes across as a rather vacuous young man, flattered by the attention, who is in it for the ride (if you’ll excuse the vulgar pun) rather than totally infatuated too. He hardly seems worth the ruin of a family.

But isn’t that exactly what happens in cases of infatuation? It’s a trainwreck of emotions that causes a trainwreck of an aftermath, damaging all concerned.

The 1960s setting, and the changing social and sexual mores are well portrayed. Hadley captures the yearning for freedom and the flailing about as people desperately try to pinpoint what this ‘freedom’ might actually look like. Or what value it really has. There’s nothing astonishing in all this (after all, these themes have been at the heart of a zillion books, movies, TV series, so we know it well) but nonetheless Hadley manages to make the story feel fresh, and interesting, and individual.

A well written novel about an older woman's love affair with a much younger man. Set in the swinging Sixties, there is a strong sense of time and place but the story is a bit flimsy and I was not satisfied with the endinh.

I like nothing better than being the unseen observer of a family (in a book, anyway!), and Free Love gives the reader plenty to be looking at.

Phyllis is a typical 1950’s/ 60’s housewife, but is she happy in her role as a housewife? She says yes, but I’d guess not, because when the son of a friend comes for dinner, Phyllis ends up making a pass at him, and then becomes obsessed - to the point that she finds out where he lives, goes to return a shirt that he had to change out of and ends up in bed with him. Then she just doesn’t go home.

Phyllis discovers the liberating 1960’s right at the end of the decade (1967), and shrugs off the responsibilities of motherhood and of being Roger’s wife. Instead she moves in with Nicky, has sex all the time and does whatever she wants to.

It felt like I was watching a car crash in slow motion. I could empathise with Phyllis’ need for freedom: her previous life in the suburbs was stifled and grey. I felt sad for her 16 year old daughter Colette, who is essentially dumped by her mother and left with a father who isn’t coping. It’s almost as if Colette becomes the adult, and her mother the carefree teenager.

I enjoyed the 1960’s setting and the contrasts of old and new. The whole story is told from a non-judgemental point of view. That’s left up to the reader to decide, and believe me, this really did prove how scarily judgemental I can be! There’s something to be said about a middle-class woman who decides to live in a filthy bedsit, expecting others who live in it to enjoy their freedom as much as she does (with her cushion of inherited money).

The plot twist at the end was a jaw dropper!

I loved this though. It might not sound like it, but I do love to hate my characters (although that’s a harsh word for the characters in this book, I think). If you feel the same way about unlikeable characters, then this could be the book for you too!

It’s the dawn of a new youth centred cultural revolution, but all that seems off the table for a family too old or too young to enjoy it. Suburbia is still locked in the stuffy old ways, with unfulfilled lives muddling along until things are shaken up by a visit from an old friend’s son. I was set not to like this, but was totally won over by the writing, which perfectly captures the spirit of those times. Also,all is not black and white. It would have been perfectly expected for the father to represent the archetypal civil servant, yet he is given a more meaningful set of values, not always obvious to the family. Our heroine however is the main protagonist, with all her failings she is very endearing in her pursuit of a richer existence, and for all her lack of reading she has given her daughter the name of a popular French novelist, Collette. I was exactly the daughter’s age in 1967, and I too read Collette. I recognised that time in much of the details of London she draws, and the characters and their concerns. This is a thoroughly enjoyable read, and I am keen to follow up with more of the same.

I read ‘Free Love’ in a handful of greedy gulps, fascinated to find out what happened to the characters as they reeled from the decisions taken throughout the novel by the protagonist, Phyllis Fischer. There are a lot of themes to dig into within the text – about sexual awakening, about gender roles, class, and politics, to name but a few – but I was initially hooked by the incendiary plot.

Our emotions are pulled in various directions as we get to know Phyllis, her family – husband, teenage daughter and young son – and friends, social circle and also those of Nicholas, too. How do we feel about the choices Phyllis makes? The reactions of those around her? How are their lives changed by her, directly or indirectly, for better or for worse?

An aspect that I particularly enjoyed, though this may just be a personal perception, is that it felt to me like it could have been the 1940s or 50s in the early chapters of the book, but as we spend more time with Phyllis and Nicholas, the 1960s really come to the fore with the politics and issues of the day. It seemed to me like Phyllis had finally been pulled into the modern world, rather than the seemingly staid one she had grown up in, like a film turning from black and white into technicolour.

A really enjoyable read with a great cast of characters. I'm looking forward to returning to it, this time to really explore all of its themes.

Many thanks to NetGalley and to the publisher, Vintage, and particularly Rosanna Boscawen for giving me the opportunity to read a copy of this book, on which this review is based.

This is my first Tessa Hadley book, thanks to RandomHouseUK who sent it my way.

Phyllis is a 40-year-old housewife in the late 60s, seemingly content with her middle-class existence. However, when a son’s friend comes over for dinner, their little post-war suburban dream-life begins to disintegrate from that night onwards.

This book was such an atmospheric read. I could really feel the difficulty of all the choices with which Phyllis was confronted. Through the various characters we got such a great insight into the changing times of the late 60s, how various different lifestyles and life experiences were converging to pave the way for a new world order, so to speak: the liberties suddenly available to Colette, Phyllis’ teenage daughter, her husband’s — a war hero — disgust with the brutality and destructiveness of the protests, and the revolutionary ideals of Nick.

The feeling I was most left with after reading this was that free love really isn’t free at all as there’s always someone left to pay a pretty hefty price for it.

A really enjoyable read and I’d gladly pick her up again.

Towards the end of the Swinging 60s, Phyllis Fischer decides to throw away her conventional life with he husband and two children for the appeals of a much younger man. Throwing herself into the Sexual Revolution, Phyllis embarks upon a whole new life. Sparking dialogue and a evocative sense of time make this an interesting and intelligent read.

Free Love is set in an interesting time period; it’s London in the late sixties. There is political unrest, societal upheaval and attempts at change as new ideologies are being protested by the young, who are distancing themselves from the previous generation. The older generation are worldly wise and have seen too much. They only seek to make more peaceful lives for themselves after living through World War II.
The people and places are described so carefully and realistically that you are there: in a suburban villa’s kitchen with its formica topped table and chipped lino floor, in a squat in the middle of Ladbroke Grove with dirty mattresses on the floor and cigarette smoke mixing with the stale smell of curry in the air, in a boutique trying on fancy dresses while an older lover slowly nods his head and brings out a thick wad of notes with which to pay.
I love the way the author describes little things such as dun-brown paint on a stairwell and the features of a wooden lift that may, or may not get stuck between floors in a rambling old building, which has very much gone to seed and is awaiting demolition. The old ladies who once lived there in safety, in genteel surroundings amongst respectable neighbours but whom are now stranded, impoverished with no other options, tore at my heartstrings.
The story centres upon one family and the repercussions of one night when a sandal is retrieved from a pond, or perhaps it is all from a time twenty years earlier….
There are secrets and people not being or communicating authentically, It’s messy and restrained all at once. Free Love is about wanting to shed an old skin amidst the tantalising possibilities of changing everything.
I loved it.

I will definitely be reading more by Tessa Hadley.

Thank you to Netgalley and the publisher for the opportunity to read an ARC of this wonderful book.

This is the first book I have read by Tessa Hadley so I don't know how it compares to her other work but, based on this first impression, I am not sure if she is an author for me.

Free Love is set in 1967 London where we follow Phyllis, wife to Roger and mother to two children. On the surface, Phyllis is dedicated to her family but a discontent simmers beneath the surface. The arrival of the son of a family friend, Nick, brings many of these feelings to the surface and lead Phyllis to make a drastic change.

Hadley is clearly a talented writer and the prose is rich with descriptive detail. For me personally though it felt a bit over-written at times and affected the pacing of the story. Also, I have a dislike of books that don't use speech marks and unfortunately Free Love falls into that category and uses dashes to signify dialogue instead. I never understand why certain authors don't use speech marks and feel like their omission doesn't add anything to the story, except confusion about who is talking.

Unfortunately I found the story very predictable and the characters were flat and uninteresting. Although I will say that the 60s setting was captured well in the family dynamics and Phyllis' point of view. Perhaps with a different story that I feel more engagement with, I might enjoy Hadley's writing more.

Thank you to Netgalley and Random House UK for the ARC.

This is, of course, extremely well-written, as you'd expect from Tessa Hadley. Character, Nikki, is compelling and Hadley's expertise in characterisation is showcased well here - Collette, for instance, as well as Phyllis are brilliantly formed. In terms of the narrative arc, there is a plot twist that is surprising and well conveyed. But listen to me, I'm talking like she's a student of mine, aren't I? Blah Blah. It's *good*, this novel, but that's what I'd expect, and personally, I love a novel set in the 1960s. There is, sad to say, a bit of yawnability with the main plot which is a little overdone. Older woman, younger man. That said, in anyone else's hands, this might have crashed and burned, and Hadley knows how to write a novel, for sure.

I'm grateful to Netgalley for the pre-read.

Brilliant writing. Skilled creation of a cast of unique, full-fleshed characters. A realisation of the time, that moment in the sixties when society underwent an apparently seismic shift, created through a layering of detail and insights into characters’ thoughts, and brought to life in Phyllis - a housewife of the establishment with an old lady name who begins to doubt everything and long for freedom. It doesn’t choose a side, not allowing an idealisation of either the old order of war time heroes, fragrant mothers, honour and civility or the new era of multiculturalism, peace, free thinking, free love. And in a way, that is both its strength and its weakness. I didn’t take any of the characters to my heart. I saw the truths but didn’t fully engage. The writer expertly takes us from the point of view of one character to another, but it felt disjointed, like I was just settling in one place and I was yanked to another. Perhaps that was the point, the intention, but it was unsatisfying. For me, the novel was like a tasting menu at a fabulous restaurant - you recognise that you are experiencing something wonderful created by a skilled practitioner of their art, but, for me, it was somewhat unsatisfying.

In 1967, forty-year-old Phyllis leaves her stock broker husband Roger, teenage daughter Colette, young son Hugh and their comfortable suburban home for cocky, self-styled rebel Nicholas and his grotty flat in Ladbroke Grove. Is this just the story of a disillusioned female keen for sexual liberation and intellectual stimulation? Or might Phyllis's impulsive act touch on family secrets that other people wish remained deeply buried? I loved Tessa Hadley's elegant, nuanced prose and this novel made me determined to read her seven previous novels, too. Warmly recommended! My thanks go to the publishers and to NetGalley for providing me with a free ARC in return for this honest and unbiased review.