A beautifully written, entirely engaging novel set in 1920s London. This is a London recovering from WWI, its inhabitatnts negotiating subtle (and not so subtle) soicial and economic change. A widow and her daughter, whose circumstances are slowly shrinking, live in a large fraying house. Taking in lodgers (or "paying guests") is the solution to their finacnial woes but opens the window to an unforseen future: a future with fresh air, fresh hope and, later, a shocking, compelling chain of events. From which point I really couldn't put this novel down. 

With an eye to wryly observed, poignant details of life, love and London, Sarah Waters really inhabits this world creating memorable characters and an unexpected narrative.