West" stereotype turned on its head: the Pakistani families in this book are not simply portrayed as saintly picked-upon underdogs who can teach their English counterparts all about life, but as a fully rounded culture in their own right. Looming largest is the local golf club’s plan to put on a costume party, in keeping with its tradition. Somewhere in the middle the pace slowed but then something happened that continued the momentum of a fine story. As she struggles to maintain her individuality as a worthwhile woman while adhering to the pressures of her fundamentalist Muslim family, she finds a friend and soul mate in the kind, quiet man of Mr.

Books about fresh, dewy eyed youngsters meeting and falling instantly in love, make me roll my eyes and grimace. The book has a couple of broadly vulgar American characters, and they turn up in the Major’s village in what he regards as disturbingly rapid succession. Taking place in a small pastoral town in the English countryside, this book features the unlikely " golden years" romance of Major Pettigrew a staunch believer in retaining the decorum of a proper Englishman and Mrs. Further details on how this Booklover Book Reviews site manages data can be found in our Privacy Policy. G. Wodehouse—and don’t mind having your emotional buttons pushed—Major Pettigrew’s Last Stand is the book for you.

There’s also the psychology of dealing with the loss by death of a loved one and the subsequent tensions of dealing with inheritances issues. During the Major's attendance at his brother's funeral and during his mourning time, he becomes attracted to an Indian widow, Mrs. I’m tired of wearing my dinner suit and having people ask me what I’m supposed to be,” he complains.

What evolves is a delightful tale that will make you chuckle at the wit, and gnash your teeth at the prejudice. This book touches on so many aspects of life that there seems to be something for just about anyone – obligation, loyalty, integrity, grief, loss, jealousy, and love.

The Major could immediately see him as a photo in the newspaper as some minor royalty recently executed during a coup. He wore a white military uniform with a short scarlet cloak and a close fitted hat adorned with medals. I thoroughly enjoyed this, stiff-upper lip, English countryside, slow burn love story of two widowed people. And many of these issues show up in parallel fashion in both the native English and immigrant Pakistani communities.

So his preference in party style is for black tie and Champagne, though he has to explain to the book’s clichéd, birdbrained club wives that this is not meant as an hommage to Noël Coward. Major Pettigrew, a retired British Army officer, is a man who is used to being in control of his routine and social life. Written with a delightfully dry sense of humour and the wisdom of a born storyteller, Major Pettigrew’s Last Stand explores the risks one takes when pursuing happiness in the face of family obligation and tradition. It's admirable that they yearn to follow their hearts despite the adversity shown by the townsfolk and of course their younger relatives who feel it's their duty to intervene. He saw another waiter slap a male dancer across the face with his white arm towel, as if to challenge him to a duel.

This 68-year-old widower, a man who has taken some of his greatest satisfaction in reading and rereading his will and is proud to grow a type of clematis vine that his neighbors think is worth stealing, has long been immune to human companionship. Pettigrew’s son Roger, a boorish financier and social bounder, eschews anything that threatens his status and his career. Whoever read my Olive Kitteridge rant, probably knows that I am not much into reading books about old people. is a stickler for protocol; a man set in his routine in both action and philosophy, although he is not without the occasional witty retort.

Mi s-a parut exact personajul excentric, de genul lui Ove, Britt Marie sau Eleanor Oliphant, fara a avea insa umorul lor. Such diversions are generally welcome and it was with great expectations that I opened the first novel by a transplanted Brit Helen Simonson, who sought to occupy her time as "a stay-at-home mother in Brooklyn [and her former:] busy advertising job" in creative writing programs. I found him a little unrounded; he followed his father into the army, and we are told that when he left he spent time teaching in a boys’ private school but was happy to leave it. Her debut novel, Major Pettigrew's Last Stand, was a NY Times bestseller and was published in twenty one countries. Including Major Pettigrew -- no small thing, when the retired military toff stereotype is so strong.

The perfect gentleman, but the most unlikely hero, the Major must ask himself what matters most: family obligation, tradition or love? There are many such screwball ingredients to keep “Major Pettigrew’s Last Stand” ever-bustling and tirelessly bright. Worse, and still more disjointed, many of the other characters seem to come from outposts of civilization in the 1930’s where people think that Mecca is a restaurant and Hindu and Muslim are the same things. I believe wholeheartedly that one of the reasons I gave this novel 5 stars was because of Altschuler’s brilliance.