TERMS & CONDITIONS

(Abacus £9.99) WHEN Ronald Searle drew his cartoons of the monstrous girls’ boarding school St Trinian’s — with its sadistic teachers and delinquent pupils — they were intended as fiction, not documentary. But Ysenda Maxtone Graham’s funny, bloodcurdling and moving account of life in girls’ boarding schools in the mid-20th century makes St Trinian’s seem positively understated.

Some lucky girls had a lovely time — one interviewee remembers being allowed to take her pony with her to school. But for every happy memory, there is one of wild eccentricity or miserable discomfort.

From the ghastly food (greyish ox liver with huge veins) to the lax educational standards — asked about the lab, one group of former pupils thought the question was about a dog — this will make old boarding-school girls sigh with nostalgia, and everyone else sigh with relief at having avoided the experience.