[Shawn_7]

Out of the Shelter is a bildungsroman - coming-of-age story. At the beginning of the novel, Timothy Young is a child in a shelter in London during WWII raids. We follow him and his family through various events - the end of the war, post-war rationing, a sister who works for the Americans before in England, then in Heidelberg (Germany).

When Timothy is invited by his sister Kath to spend some vacation weeks in Heidelberg, he's 16-y-o but in a sense still in his 'shelter' since he has never had a girl-friend or kissed a girl.

The novel is interesting also because it offers a perspective on post-war Germany, reliable enough since the novel is autobiographical. It is also the last non-postmodernist Lodge's novel, the bext being Changing Places. So you'll not find any metafictional games or Intertextuality in it, it's an 'Old Style' novel in this sense.

A very good reading, anyway.

[eugene51]

Thanks for the reccommendation. Lodge is an interesting writer, and this sounds good.