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Where
is Susan?
Jane Shaw
May 2006, 173pp, ISBN 978 09552973 2 8
£12.99 (includes p&p in the UK)
Or £6.90 (inc VAT)/ $9.99 US plus sales tax as an ebook for the Kindle - click here to buy directly via Amazon
Where is Susan? is set in a new destination
for Jane Shaw, Venice. Susan and her cousin Midge arrive there expecting
to meet Charlotte and spend a few days exploring before welcoming Susan’s
parents off the ship which has brought them from Africa. Susan, rendered
even more excitable than usual by the prospect of seeing her parents
after three years, is heart-broken when she learns that their ship is
in quarantine because of suspected yellow fever, and the pair are startled
to find that their hotel has no record of their booking. Susan, naturally,
falls on her feet and the two girls find refuge with the charming sister
of a gondolier. Meanwhile, Charlotte is combing the city for her sister
and cousin. The introduction of the ghastly Gascoignes, in Venice for
the ‘Bean-alley’ (Susan’s version of the Biennale), ensures
Susan and Midge have a difficult time avoiding them while trying to
find Charlotte and the Lyles. In the end, of course, everyone is reunited
after Susan’s successful capture of a hotel thief.
As with all Jane Shaw’s books, the charm of the story is enhanced
by the lively descriptions of setting. The essential elements of Venetian
life, like pizza, gondoliers, pigeons and expensive cafes in Piazza
San Marco all feature. The Gascoignes are as frightful as ever, although
Peregrine (Pea-green to his friends) has developed a taste for Nuttella
spread which he shares with the girls. Frantic chases across the city
by foot, gondolier and vaporetto are required in order to reunite one
of Charlotte’s newly-acquired young men with a valuable stamp which
the beautiful but slightly incompetent spy placed in Susan’s papers
for safe-keeping. Readers familiar with Susan will know this is about
the silliest move any one could make!
To learn more about Jane Shaw's life and the archive of her personal papers, now deposited in the National Library of Scotland, click here. To read the opening chapters of The Man at the Villa Carlotta, an unfinished manuscript by Jane Shaw, click here. To view maps of the sites where Jane Shaw's books are set, drawn by Elsepth Insch, click here.
Have you read Susan
and Friends: The Jane Shaw Companion?
