BEST BOOKS ON... SHOPPING
THE bestselling author suggests key novels to help you through the trickier times in life. THIS is a busy time of year for those of us who care about clothes: we’re on the cusp of two seasons, our wardrobes are in awkward transition, we have literally nothing to wear.
Of course, there are people around who don’t feel like that. I’m married to one. His wardrobe transitions twice a year — once when the cardi goes on, and once when it comes off again. New clothes are purchased only when old ones have fallen apart.
It says a lot about him as, in Sense And Sensibility, Robert Ferrars’s purchase of a toothpick-case says a lot, too.
Austen’s heroine, Elinor, comes across this young man in Gray’s jewellery shop. He keeps her waiting, while he selects the ivory, gold and pearls to adorn his choice; he grandly announces the ‘last day on which his existence could continue without’ it.
And with a glance that ‘seemed to demand rather than express admiration’, he takes his leave. Elinor makes assumptions about his character there and then — and all are correct. By our shopping are we defined.
There was more opportunity for character study, though, back on the old-fashioned High Street. The gloom of the mall is much more impersonal.
Catherine O’Flynn’s thriller What Was Lost is set in a huge, soulless shopping centre, built on the site where a young girl vanished 20 years before. Could it be that little Kate has come back to haunt it? And how much was her disappearance caused by the death of her community?
Back to the warm intimacy of the independent shop, Isabel Wolff’s A Vintage Affair celebrates one of those wonderful second-hand boutiques that heal a fashionista’s conscience.
Broken-hearted Phoebe opens a vintage shop in London, burying herself and her trauma in Pucci and Balenciaga. Hunting for stock, she meets an elderly French lady with an exquisite, preserved wardrobe that may hold the secrets to her past.
Because good clothes, treated well, are not just a financial investment, they’re an emotional one: they become part of the fabric of our lives.