Alison Lurie published ten novels, among them Foreign Affairs (which won the Pulitzer Prize), The Truth About Lorin Jones (winner of the Prix Femina etranger), and The Last Resort. She was also the author of many works of non-fiction, including The Language of Clothes, Don't Tell the Grownups, Familiar Spirits, and two collections of essays and reviews, Reading for Fun and Words and Worlds. She taught literature, folklore and creative writing at Cornell University for many years and was the Whiton Professor of American Literature emerita. She lived in upstate New York but also spent much time in Key West, Florida and in London, all of which provided settings for her fiction. She married the writer Edward Hower, and had three sons and three grandchildren. Alison Lurie died in 2020.
Awesomely good * Sunday Times * A brilliant and seemingly effortless accomplishment...steady uninterrupted delight * Sunday Telegraph * Lurie is and really is, different. She writes with great elegance, as frostily clear as the climate she describes; and with sharp intelligence piercing through every sentence. She is very funny as well * Observer * I am re-reading with enormous delight and greed. If you're new to them, lucky you: marvellously astute comedies of social, moral and sexual manners, their witty exuberance is nothing short of inspirational. -- Helen Simpson Not for the prim, this is definitely adult education, as well as a bright entertainment * Kirkus Reviews *