Girl From The Fiction Department: A Portrait Of Sonia Orwell

The Girl from the Fiction Department is Hilary Spurling's absorbing biography of George Orwell's second wife. George Orwell's second wife was portrayed by her husband's biographers as a manipulative gold-digger who would stop at nothing to keep control of his legacy. But the truth about Sonia Orwell - the model for Julia in Nineteen Eighty-Four - was altogether different. Beautiful, intelligent and fiercely idealistic, she lived at the heart of London's literary and artistic scene before her marriage to Orwell changed her life for ever. Burdened with the almost impossible task of protecting Orwell's estate, Sonia's loyalty to her late husband brought her nothing but poverty and despair. 'Lucid, compassionate. Brings this complex woman, and the times she lived in, vibrantly to life' Sunday Tribune 'Absorbing and sparkling. Brilliant. I urge you to read this provocative book' Sunday Express 'A story to move you to tears' Scotsman Hilary Spurling is a prize-winning biographer whose books include Ivy: The Life of Ivy Compton-Burnett, The Unknown Matisse, Matisse the Master and La Grande Therese.