Perfect explanation, paperback/eleanor anstruther

Finalist for the Desmond Elliott Prize A superb debut* novel--based on the story of the authors grandmother--following an aristocratic woman who abandons her family and her money in search of a life she can claim as her own.

(* The Guardian ) Enid Campbell, granddaughter of a duke, grew up surrounded by servants, wanting for nothing except love.

But when her brother died in the First World War, a new heir was needed, and it was up to Enid to provide it.

A troubled marriage and three children soon followed.

Broken by postpartum depression, overwhelmed by motherhood and a loveless marriage, Enid made the shocking decision to abandon her family, thereby starting a chain of events--a kidnap, a court case, and selling her son to her sister for 500--that reverberated through the generations.

Interweaving one significant day in 1964, when it seems the family will reunite for one last time, with a decade during the interwar period, A Perfect Explanation explores the perils of aristocratic privilege, where inheritance is everything and happiness is hard won.

About author(s): ELEANOR ANSTRUTHER was born in London, educated at Westminster School, and read History of Art at Manchester University.

She lives on a farm in Surrey with her twin boys.

A Perfect Explanation is her debut novel.