The corner that held them/sylvia townsend warner

One of the great British novels of the twentieth century: a narrative of extraordinary reach, power and beauty Sarah Waters The nuns who enter a medieval Norfolk convent are told to renounce the world, but the world still finds ways to trouble them, whether it is through fire, floods, pestilence, a collapsing spire, jealous rivalries, a priest with a secret or a plague of caterpillars.

As we follow their daily lives over three centuries, this masterpiece of historical fiction re-creates a world run by women.

As an act of imagined history this novel has few rivals.

Also, as it happens, a work of high, frequent comedy George Steiner, The Times Literary Supplement Spellbinding .

One starts rereading as soon as one has reached the last page Sunday Times Magnificent Philip Hensher, Daily Telegraph.