This is a beautifully-written novel set in 1967. Phyllis Fischer, living a conventional middle class life with her husband Roger and two children, Colette and Hugh, falls in love with the son of her husband’s friends and so upends their comfortable family life. It’s rich in characterisation and description - I loved every page and rationed it towards the end as I didn’t want to finish. It’s a dreamy, evocative read with memorable characters. I particularly liked Colette and how she deals with her mother’s departure. Free Love transported me from middle class suburbia to bohemian London and I revelled in every detail. Captivating!

Hadley is a writer of great economy and detail - not the contradiction such a statement might appear be in other hands. She evokes a place and time beautifully. Inhabits her characters fully. For all her brilliance, her rarified world view has perhaps been in danger of feeling a little out of step in recent times. Here, she uses it brilliantly to create something that does timely despite the 1960s setting. That she has managed to craft a coming of age novel for what are effectively three different 'generations' of women (in the cultural, if not necessarily literal sense) and to a lesser degree men, is a coup. That she's managed to do it so lightly is the work of a writer at the top of her game. Recommended.

London in the 1960,s means different things to different people. Phyllis is a dutiful wife and mother but suddenly she wakes up to being in love with a friend of her son when they kiss .He is a communist sympathiser and she wakes up to politics as well as passion with him. She then makes an unusual decision, to leave her comfortable middle class life to be with her new lover.1967 is a time of change and new ideas for a number of people and this novel captures this time brilliantly. The insight she gives us into people’s lives is brilliantly told. Bravery comes in many forms and Phyllis is a strong and very brave woman. It is a shame her lover does not live up to her expectations. The story becomes a sad tale of lost relationships, betrayal and missed opportunities

The writing is brilliant but unfortunately the plot didn’t live up to its initial promise. I couldn’t move past some of the similarities to The Graduate.

London’s leafy suburbs towards the end of the so-called Summer of Love in 1967, and forty year-old Phyllis Fischer finds her own different brand of love. Upper middle-class with two children and married to decent upstanding Roger, an Arab specialist in the Foreign Office, she embarks upon an entirely unplanned and for her, unprecedented love affair with a much younger tyro writer – Nicholas, a son of friends of theirs. Nicky is cynical, scruffy and self-consciously radical. The quotidian, comfortable family life of the Fischers is portrayed with telling precision and intelligence, located firmly in the mores of late ‘60s swinging Britain – despite the changes in society, a time of relative bourgeois certainty and comfort. As Tessa Hadley says in her acknowledgements, she wanted to capture “the spirt of those times”, which she does with elegance and authenticity. But as Phyllis’s infatuation with her young lover grows, she begins to take risks, is fully absorbed in her new passion and she discovers that while we may well have been entering a new permissive age of hedonism, quotidian complications are always there even for the new age, and to amend the familiar truism – there really is no such thing as free love. Phyllis makes a sudden decision which has immense ramifications for herself and her family, and we see how she and those close to her have their lives turned upside-down by this hasty choice.

Admittedly, when I read the premise for this I wasn’t sure if I would like it or not, so I did begin the book with mild trepidation, but this was soon expelled in favour of a desperate need to turn each page and read more. This was a super interesting read, and since I studied the 1960s last year – or ‘the long decade’ – I was looking forward to experiencing a book set just in this time. It was a good book, not brilliant, nor my favourite, but it was compelling.

This is very much a character-driven rather than plot-driven story, so if that’s not your kind of thing it won’t be for you. However, the characters are fascinating, and they just grow more intriguing as the book carries on and we learn more about them, their lives and their beliefs. The main character, Phyllis, is who we spend most of our time with and she’s a character even now I think a lot of women will recognised and sympathise with, whilst the way she she represents womanhood and the role of women in society has been done countless times before, it didn’t feel boring or stale. Her journey is unsurprising in the beginning, however I still enjoyed it, and as the book goes on she grows beyond this. Yet, I should note Phyllis can get a little old a little too fast, towards halfway through Free Love I was starting to grow a bit fed up with her an emotional whims – she’s forty, she should know better.

However, as the book progresses the narrative switches to a different character instead of Phyllis, who begins to slowly fade into the background, and we spent time with arguably my favourite character out of all of them, Phyllis’ daughter Collette. She’s a teenager living through the 1960s and discovering what it means to grow into a women without her mum by her side, and the conflicts you see rise in her, the confusion especially, expertly mirrors the way a lot of young woman feel. I particularly enjoyed her fumbling intellectual journey paralleled with her growth into a woman, it felt authentic and her attraction to certain new modes of life made sense, the only thing I didn’t like was her ending but it was still believable.

The secondary characters in this also helped to serve the book in brilliant ways, from Roger, Phyllis’ estranged husband, to her son Hugh where the exploration of the effect of the ‘old ways’ in children truly takes place. The characters we also meet in London are all curious, and I enjoyed the scenes where we got to see them all interact with each other, and how their different lives intersected but were also formed through their beliefs. The only secondary character I grew to have any issue with was Nikki, who at first was exciting as he is the character who truly introduces the action of the book, and the conflict of beliefs that runs through it, but who the character he grew into was one I found hard to engage with and ultimately hoped I would not see again.

An integral aspect of this book is the beliefs tied to it and it’s characters. Free Love is very much not only about exploring family dynamics and womanhood (for white women) in 1960s Britain, but also about Britain’s cultural and political beliefs at the time. Each character is assigned a different cultural and political standpoint whether it’s Roger who is the old, stiff-upper lip British colonialist, to Nikki’s new anti-capitalist, anti-colonial stance; or to someone like Phyllis who is drawn to the new debates with a desire to learn and discover. It makes for interesting storytelling, and conversation, but there were times I found myself getting lost as the narrative waded too deeply into this debate and losing sight of the characters.

Hadley is also able to create a very believable 1960s British setting within the book, at no time did I forget where we are, and it was clear she knew what feeling and atmosphere she intended to capture. I particularly enjoyed London at this time, and reading about the streets and the life contained within it as it always seemed so vibrant.

I would note, that this doesn’t do anything new or revolutionary with the ideas contained within it, everything is a trope I have seen before, or a conflict that is being rehashed for this book. As well as this, you should be aware this really does focus on the experience of white, middle-class British people and little else at this time; Hadley does attempt to include conversations through secondary characters to encompass more than just the white experience, but they are small and ultimately not the focus. Yet, even though it doesn’t do anything I would label as new, it is still well-written and nicely explores these themes.

Overall, it’s a great book, and I’m glad this is my first Hadley book as I’m now intrigued to see what else she has written and discover what else she has to say. It’s definitely one to pick up if you enjoy historical fiction and politics, if not this will be a miss for you.

I’m not sure why, but this is the first title I’ve read by Tessa Hadley and it’s a totally compelling page Turner. I have warm and vivid memories of the 1960s and the huge changes that were sweeping the world; hippies and the peace movement, civil rights, the pill, female empowerment and more and Free Love captures to perfection that undercurrent of change that was almost palpable.

The writing is perfectly pitched; it’s simple but but every word counts. It’s a story of an awakening; an early mid life crisis where values are challenged and changed, but at what cost? The characters have depth and I warmed to them and the unfolding situation. Beautifully written and after this taster, I’m going to look for more from Tessa.

My thanks to the publisher for a review copy via Netgalley.

I've heard so many people talking about this book and both the cover and synopsis really intrigued me!

Set in the sixties, we follow 40-year-old housewife Phyllis who is living a normal but unfulfilling life. After meeting a younger family friend, she experiences a sexual awakening that is set to change her life drastically. Throughout the book not only do we get a deep understand of Phyllis and her frustrations and desires, but also her husband and children who have to cope with the upheaval to their family life.

This is my first time reading one of Tessa Hadley's novels and I'd definitely consider picking up more of her work. The writing was excellent and each of the characters were really well developed and explored. I think you could easily love or hate Phyllis because of her attitude and actions, but I admired the way she decided that her life wasn't yet finished, and that there was still plenty of time for more adventures.

Set initially in a quiet, leafy suburb of London we meet the Fischer family, Roger, Phyllis, Colette and Hugh who live a conventional, and unremarkable, life together, that is until homemaker, Phyllis becomes hopelessly infatuated with the son of a family friend. Nick Knight is twenty years her junior and his louche lifestyle is far removed from the middle class respectability which has stifled Phyllis's natural exuberance for far too long.

The setting is reminiscent of a bygone era and the ambiguous sexual morality of the 1960s is juxtaposed alongside the conventionality of middle class suburbia. The country was undergoing great changes, both socially and economically and it was, most certainly, a time of discovery and unconventionality, the old order was gone and a new 'free loving' generation was going forward.

Each of the central characters are superbly flawed, and, it must be said, rather difficult to like, so all credit to the author for creating a set of people who, despite their many faults, start to become more credible as the story unfolds. Clever, sophisticated, entirely absorbing, Free Love is Tessa Hadley writing at her absolute best.

I think I requested this book through a NetGalley e-mail because the marketing around it made it sound like a heady, intriguing romance that would make me long for summer. However, looking at the cover and reflecting on it now, I’m struck by how unlike my usual tastes it actually is.

It’s 1967 in London and the Fischer family are welcoming a dinner guest. Roger Fischer is a family man who works in the Foreign Office while Phyllis Fischer is a dutiful housewife and mother to quiet, smart teenager Colette and eloquent, bright boy Hugh. Their guest is Nicky, a 20-something rebellious free spirit, whose youth and ideas beguile Phyllis and prompt an illicit affair. Suddenly, Phyllis sees the world differently and she’s making decisions that no one, especially herself, expected her to make.

Phyllis is clearly dissatisfied with her domestic life from the very start of the book and that’s almost certainly what caused her head to be turned by Nick. She is pretty superficial and I couldn’t warm to her, which got more difficult as the book went on. While I understand her yearning for something more, I was appalled at the way she went about it, so there was very little room for me to find the sympathy.

Colette reminded me of myself at 15 and I’m sure she will resonate with many young bookish girls. I think Colette was the only character that I really wanted to get out of the book in one, happy, whole piece. She seems to have spent most of her life in the shadow of her pretty, perfect mother and wants nothing more than to be just like her. Of course, when her mother started to do questionable things and make terrible choices, I feared that she’d follow.

Nicky’s chaotic energy spelled disaster from the moment he was introduced. There was one moment at the very beginning when I was worried that it would be Colette that he would corrupt, which would have made for a highly uncomfortable, controversial novel, given her age. I know that people like Nicky exist and they nearly always follow a life similar to the one he leads. Therefore, I felt that he was just a huge walking stereotype for a late 1960s bohemian.

Phyllis is obsessed with Nicky and as difficult as I found the writing style to get along with, I have to admit that it works to depict her intoxicated stream of consciousness. The affair literally consumes Phyllis until eventually it is all that she can think about. Anyone who has ever been completely and ridiculously infatuated with someone will know the craziness that comes with that headspace and Hadley does a great job of showing it within Phyllis.

The book is set in 1960s London and that comes with all of the attitudes of the time. Phyllis feels unsafe walking through Black communities and she compares it to the time she spent living in Egypt. These brief pictures of London life during that time are few and far between and I would have loved more interaction between the middle class white characters and the growing population of ethnic minorities in the city.

I was much more interested and invested in Colette’s story than Phyllis’. Like most teenagers, she wants nothing more than to be liked and accepted by everyone. She does this by imitating the adults around her and this of course, makes her vulnerable to being exploited by creepy older men. I was really concerned for her wellbeing for the whole of the second half of the book and I wanted to do what Phyllis should have been doing -educate and protect Colette.

Free Love is an exploratory study of unfulfilled minds and hearts and how they break free from the chains that bind them. It’s about discovering inner desire and finding a different version of yourself. However, it’s also a lesson that it doesn’t always necessarily lead to eternal happiness. Hadley writes in long, meandering sentences which I struggled with but which does undoubtedly suit the atmosphere of the book. I finished it full of anger and frustration towards both Phyllis and Nicky, which is perhaps not quite what the author intended!

This is an incredibly compulsive story about a woman’s sexual awakening. This audacious story reveals the inner workings on sexual freedom and romance

Set in 1960's London, we meet housewife Phyllis, her husband and two kids. But she starts an affair with a much younger man and changes all of their lives forever.

This was a slow burner, but the final third of the book made up for it.

I actually preferred the daughters story and found her the most interesting character. And I liked the unexpected twists at the end concerning the husband.

A beautifully written portrayal of a woman growing older who falls for a much younger man - and the effects this has on all the members of her family as well as her and the lover. The detail is exquisite and we know each character so well as we get inside their heads. A memorable story of a summer of love that goes too far for everyone.

A really good read.

Set in middle class London in the 1960’s, housewife Phyllis decides to change her life.
An unexpected plot twist halfway through added to the story and I became more invested in this novel.
Lots of interesting characters. I’m not sure I liked Phyllis or some of her decisions but her story makes for an interesting read.

Although this kind of book is way out of my comfort zone, I was attracted to it by the premise, setting and by the fact that author Tessa Hadley is from Cardiff, which makes me happy as a native of Wales myself.
Despite myself, I found that I quite enjoyed the book. Hadley’s writing throughout is excellent, and she captures the ethos and the feel of the 1960s setting perfectly. The author has a true skill with words and creates vivid pictures to set the scene of middle-class London during the ‘60s.
The story is basically that of Phyllis, a bored, middle-class housewife who finds herself attracted to a “bit of rough”, and this situation awakens a typically ‘60s free-living spark within her which changes her life and her family’s.
In the second part of the book, Phyllis’ daughter Collette experiences her own awakening, but this narrative shift results in a story that isn’t quite as satisfying as her mother’s, and the book becomes focussed on moral choices taken by the characters.
Overall I enjoyed it, despite the shift in tone between the two halves of the story - the book starts like “Girl on a Motorcycle” but ends like “Look Back in Anger” - and Tessa Hadley is no doubt a highly-skilled writer.

Really loved this fantastic book, set in the sixties. When Phyllis makes a life changing decision the repercussion are felt by all, with many consuequences. Superbly written, I absolutely loved it.

Free Love was actually my first read of Tessa Hadley’s books. It opens with a great few paragraphs explaining our main character, Phyllis Fischer, sitting at her dressing table, noticing as the late summer’s day turns into evening, and I was filled with that feeling that this was going to be a wonderfully observed novel. It vividly portrays how our main character is almost a scene setter in her own life. Following and obeying the rules of what her suburban life should look like and complying with the views of her husband, without her realising that at 40 years old, she can actually put the ‘How To’ manual to one side and find out who she actually wants to be.

However, Phyllis doesn’t wake up one morning thinking this, no. The catalyst that starts this dramatic change to her life is a young dinner guest by the name of Nicky. A son of old friends of her husbands and his parents, he has recently moved down to London and it has been arrange that he visits the Fischers for supper. Phyllis, a natural flirt, is somewhat bewitched by Nicky, and later in the evening, throws him off guard by kissing him outside, when no one can see.

What follows is a story of both the awakening of Phyllis and the changes that it forces onto the family as a whole and as individuals.

We follow Phyllis as she moves out of the family home, to be with Nicky, into a room with a shared bathroom in a building in Ladbroke Grove, filled with lots of different people and living a somewhat bohemian lifestyle. It explores her role as a parent and I found her relationships with her children interesting. A seemingly close bond with her son, but maybe Phyllis needs him more than he needs her, and a not so close bond with her daughter, who ends up being the one most effected by her mother’s disappearance. I can’t say I liked Phyllis for leaving her kids, however it really explores this part of her personality and I really enjoyed the almost parallel coming of age story of the daughter.

A comfortably lived life and a small inheritance from her mother allows Phyllis somewhat to make this change in her living arrangements along with Nicky receiving money from his mother to boost his low earnings but this seems to fit within their bohemian life and friends they make and the author cleverly uses a nurse, who lives across the hall, to give this a balance and a more true to life experience.

At about a third into the book it’s second storyline kicks in and really adds to the depth of the story. Ultimately I found this a very evocative read and will definitely look at reading more of this authors work.

Tessa Hadley does an excellent job of evoking the end of the 1960s, with its sense of freedom, rebellion, possibility and the pre-eminence of youth. In this story of a conventional wife and mother who falls in love, and out of conventionality, with the much younger son of friends, Hadley succeeds in telling a gripping story, presenting well-rounded and believable characters, whilst also considering themes of shifting mores, political conflict and generational divisions.

I enjoyed it and appreciated the lightness of touch, Hadley manages to avoid cliches in writing about what can be a cliched era, and her depiction of teenage angst, mother/child relationships and love is very good.

Thanks to Netgalley and the publishers for a review copy.

Love this story, transporting back to the 60s, the characters were great and loved how they were introduced throughout the book.....A great read

Having never read anything by this author before it took me a while to adjust to her writing style and the pace of the book. I got to about 30% through it then I was absolutely hooked and spent the entire day reading until I had finished.

Sexual awakening, romance and coming of age all in one. Set during the late 60s in the U.K.

Phyllis, devoted wife, attentive mother. Domesticated.
It isn't until she kisses their friends son that she realises how unhappy she is with the confinement and restraints of her suburban family life. When she decides to cut all ties and leave with just a brief note everything falls apart with her absense.

Her daughter Colette the most effected of her children and one of my favourite characters. At 16 she is on the cusp of adulthood yet still shut out from the innoncence of childhood and the secrets grownups share. Watching her grow as a character is what I loved reading the most.

Tessa's writing brilliantly captures every character. Even the ones that weren't meant to be likeable I still found interesting as they were well written with attention to detail. The delicacy of Collette and Phyllis' emotions throughout the book. Hugh's indifference towards his mother when she leaves, unspoken words and shifting family dynamics, and the fallout that comes from her infidelity.