The Balkan Trilogy

<p><b>'Her gallery of personages is huge, her scene painting superb, her pathos controlled, her humour quiet and civilised' Anthony Burgess</b><br><b><br>'So glittering is the overall parade - and so entertaining the surface - that the trilogy remains excitingly vivid; it amuses, it diverts and it informs, and to do these things so elegantly is no small achievement'<i> Sunday Times</i></b><br><br><b>'A fantastically tart and readable account of life in eastern Europe at the start of the war' Sarah Waters<br><br></b><i>The Balkan Trilogy</i> is the story of a marriage and of a war, a vast, teeming, and complex masterpiece in which Olivia Manning brings the uncertainty and adventure of civilian existence under political and military siege to vibrant life.<br><br>At the heart of the trilogy are newly-weds Guy and Harriet Pringle, who arrive in Bucharest - the so-called Paris of the East - in the autumn of 1939, just weeks after the German invasion of Poland. Guy's lecturing job awaits, alongside friends and the ever-ardent Sophie - but for Harriet, alone and naive, it's a strange new life. Other surprises follow: Romania joins the Axis, and before long German soldiers overrun the capital. The Pringles flee south to Greece, part of a group of refugees made up of White Russians, journalists, con artists, and dignitaries. In Athens, however, the couple will face a new challenge of their own...</p>