Paul Sturgis is a retired bank manager who lives alone in a dark little
flat. He walks alone and dines alone, seeking out and taking pleasure in
small exchanges with strangers: the cheerful Australian girl who cuts
his hair, the lady at the dry cleaners. His only relative - and only
acquaintance - is a widowed cousin by marriage, herself a virtual
stranger, to whom he pays ritualistic visits on a Sunday afternoon.
Trying to make sense of his current solitary state, and fearing that his
destiny may be to die among strangers, Sturgis trawls through memories
of his failed relationships and finds himself longing for companionship,
or at the very least a conversation. But then a chance encounter with a
stranger - a recently divorced and demanding younger woman - shakes up
his routine, and when an old girlfriend appears on the scene, Sturgis is
forced to make a decision about how (and with whom) he wants to spend
the rest of his days....
Anita Brookner was born in South London in 1928, the daughter of a
Polish immigrant family. She trained as an art historian and worked at
the Courtauld Institute of Art until her retirement in 1988. She
published her first novel, A Start in Life, in 1981 and her 24th,
Strangers, in 2009. As well as fiction, Anita Brookner has published a
number of volumes of art criticism.
