Penguin Modern Classics: The Slaves of Solitude

Fleeing the bombs in London, the determinedly optimistic Miss Roach finds refuge in the Rosamund Tea Rooms, a shabby boarding house in the outer suburbs. Its bleak, soulless atmosphere hangs over the inhabitants, slaves of solitude whose lonely embittered lives hold not a glimmer of comfort. Unlike Miss Roach whose tentative hopes of escape take the shape of an amusing, talkative American Lieutenant.
'A black comedy of manners... powerfully redemptive... we are led from this black hole of boredom... by a humour... which in its magical fusion of fact and fantasy, becomes an illumination of reality.'
Michael Holroyd