London is one of my favourite cities (says any white girl ever). It’s overwhelming and far too big, so fun and full of culture and good food and some of the best book shops I’ve ever been to. And because life is cruel, I don’t get to go to London nearly as often as I would like to, so instead I escape into books set there. It’s a bit of a dubious coping strategy, as it usually makes me miss London even more, but then I do like to torture myself. You’ve been warned. Enter our main character for this blog post: London.
One Day by David Nicholls
Ah, One Day. Will I ever get over you? No. Which is precisely why I will never stop talking about David Nicholl’s masterpiece either. One Day isn’t set solely in London, the story begins in Edinburgh, and as it is set over many years, many locations play a central role in the novel. But I would argue almost none of them are as important to the story as London, where our protagonists Emma and Dexter live for multiple years and experience some of their most memorable moments. The evening they spent together on Primrose Hill is lodged in my mind forever, and whenever I am there I think of the two of them (isn’t it wild how characters in a book can become so real to us we think of them when we go to a specific place?). One Day is really just the story of Em and Dex, two best friends who meet at university and then fall in and out of each other’s life over the years, and we get to see them on the very same day each year and thereby witness the many small and big changes they undergo. It’s a devastatingly beautiful ode to being alive, and it makes me want to be young and in London very badly.
Caledonian Road by Andrew O’Hagan
Caledonian Road isn’t my favourite book by Andrew O’Hagan. That title will probably forever belong to the utter perfection that is Mayflies. But while Caledonian Road has its flaws (in my humble opinion), I adored it for its sprawling portrayal of mid-Covid London. It is, as the title suggests, set on Caledonia Road and follows Londoners, both very privileged and much less so. It grapples with ideas and phenomena of our modern age, and that are associated with living in a big, fast, ever-changing city trying to deal with the consequences of a pandemic. We get to read from multiple perspectives and I found a lot of the characters both unlikable and yet relatable. Caledonia Road is a state of the nation novel in that it seeks to not only highlight London-specific problems, but those of Britain as a whole. It’s political and messy and about the dynamics of power. It lost me at times when I felt overwhelmed by the scope of it, but I feel as though this is a novel that is best read twice in order to really get to the many nuances of this story. Every single page basically drips with modern-day London though, which is one of my very favourite settings.
After You’d Gone by Maggie O’Farrell
With After You’d Gone Maggie O’Farrell delivered such a haunting love story that it is easy to forget about the setting of the book. But then again, although it seems as though our main characters Alice and John could have fallen for each other anywhere, their story is explicitly linked to London due to a plot point I cannot reveal as it would be a spoiler. The importance of this particular city is being made clear at the very start of the novel, when Alice decides to take a train from London to Edinburgh on a whim, only to return immediately after having seen something shocking at Waverley station in Edinburgh. To me, After You’d Gone is one of those books that are hard to describe, because the beauty is in the writing and the characterisation, although I wouldn’t say that there’s no plot to be found in this story. It’s a story that jumps between different times and generations, but one quite peaceful part of it is set in London, and that has stuck with me ever since.
The Lesser Bohemians by Eimear McBride
Out of all the books I have mentioned in this blog post, The Lesser Bohemians is the one that is most strongly tied to London. Eimear McBride has managed to write a story that I cannot imagine being set anywhere other than Camden, or the North London area more generally. We follow an unnamed Irish acting student who, aged 18, moves to London and falls in love with a much older actor. As she gets to know him and the city, their love story gets intertwined with the sprawling metropolis in such a beautiful way that is hard to describe. If you know North London somewhat well, you will be able to trace their steps in your mind at certain points, and it will make you feel as though you were there with them. The Lesser Bohemians is a love letter to 1990’s London, which is a London I never experienced, and yet it feels so familiar and magnetic and my God, I just really love this book.
Well well well, if I haven’t just made myself desperately want to buy a train ticket to London. Because I’m a responsible adult, I might just reread After You’d Gone instead, because it’s been far too long since I’ve read that book anyway. But if you have any recommendations for books in which London is the true main character, please send them my way. Happy reading!
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