Paperback. Indian scene cover with blue title.

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A FROST PAPERBACK is a loved book which a member of the Frost family has checked for condition, cleanliness, completeness and readability. When the buyer collects their book, the delivery charge of £3.00 is not made

In this first volume of her autobiography, M.M.Kaye, author of “The Far Pavilions”, evokes the inspiration behind her much-loved novels – India, where she was born and which, throughout a comfortless exile in England, remained “home” for her. From earliest childhood in Simla, among the foothills of the Himalayas, where half the horizon was bounded by snow peaks, to winters in Delhi, where she fell in love with the dry, dusty expanse of the Indian plains, M.M.Kaye’s heart and mind were open to every beauty and strangeness. She tells her story with vitality and freshness as someone for whom childhood remains a passionate reality. We learn of her brother, Bill – sent away, as the author and her sister were to be later, to the chilly banishment of an English boarding school. We hear of parties and camping expeditions with children both Indian and European. And of “Tacklow” the author’s remarkable and adored father, who had met and married the children’s mother in China and brought her back to India. Despite Tacklow’s honourable service, the family was sent back to England with a tiny pension, and M.M.Kaye tells of her feelings of exile there. Home was always India and this first volume ends when the author at 18 joyfully returns.

Review: I loved the Far Pavilions and was fascinated by MM Kaye’s life story, so I tracked down and ordered this copy of the first part. She writes beautifully about her early days in India and subsequent disappointment when she travelled ‘home’ to England. I found the whole account fascinating and wonderfully descriptive, supplemented by photographs left over after many were destroyed in a fire at the family home. It is remarkable that even though she was writing this autobiography when she was well over 70 her recollections are so clear and engaging. It is also fascinating, having just read the Far Pavilions for the second time, to recognise events from her life that she wove into the fictional story.

Mary Margaret “Mollie” Kaye (21 August 1908 – 29 January 2004) was a British writer. Her most famous book is The Far Pavilions (1978).