The Fortnight in September

By: R.C. Sherriff

Narrated by: Jilly Bond

Length: 9 hrs and 40 mins

Publisher's summary

This charming, timeless classic about a family of five setting out on their annual seaside vacation is “the most uplifting, life-affirming novel I can think of...the beautiful dignity to be found in everyday living has rarely been captured more delicately” (Kazuo Ishiguro).

Meet the Stevens family as they prepare to embark on their yearly holiday to the coast of England. Mr. and Mrs. Stevens first made the trip to Bognor Regis on their honeymoon, and the tradition has continued ever since. They stay in the same guesthouse and follow the same carefully honed schedule - now accompanied by their three children, 20-year-old Mary, 17-year-old Dick, and little brother Ernie.

Arriving in Bognor, they head to Seaview, the guesthouse where they stay every year. It’s a bit shabbier than it once was - the landlord has died and his wife is struggling as the number of guests dwindles every year. But the family finds bliss in booking a slightly bigger cabana, with a balcony, and in their rediscovery of the familiar places they visit every year.

Mr. Stevens goes on his annual walk across the downs, reflecting on his life, his worries and disappointments, and returns refreshed. Mrs. Stevens treasures an hour spent sitting alone with her medicinal glass of port. Mary has her first small taste of romance. And Dick pulls himself out of the malaise he’s sunk into since graduation, resolving to work towards a new career. The Stevenses savor every moment of their holiday, aware that things may not be the same next year.

Delightfully nostalgic and soothing, The Fortnight in September is an extraordinary novel about ordinary people enjoying life’s simple pleasures.

©1931 R.C. Sherriff. Copyright renewed ©1959 The Estate of R.C. Sherriff. Originally published in Great Britain in 1931 by Victor Gollancz. (P)2021 Simon & Schuster, Inc. All rights reserved.

British Family on Holiday

A sweet, slow-moving tale of a middle-class British family's very routine holiday at the seashore.

Charming and exquisite simplicity

We are transported to the world of small people with small, ordinary lives and simple, banal pleasures but who are still able to dream and imagine ambitions. An insightful book which never loses touch with what it means to be human.

Published in 1931

This is a simple story about simple people.

I kept wondering the year. The father was annoyingly meticulous in his planning. The mother was distressingly timid. I kept wanting her to speak up or show some gumption. Their behavior was puzzling. and annoying. The children were bland.. I tried to imagine their clothing but couldn't since I didn't know the time period.

After I finished I looked up the author and decided the time would have been in the late 1920s. Knowing that would have made the novel more enjoyable.

Delightful!

This was just the fortnight of holiday I needed in a trying time. The characters are so honestly portrayed you hope and blush and struggle with them. The story brought all the best of the south coast of England to life, I could almost hear the gulls and did not want the story or holiday to end.

Superb

A soothing balm from a time past. Beautifully performed. The author’s note at the end is worth a listen. So enjoyable break from all other topics!

Gentle, charming and delightful

This is a rarity, a book about a family on their annual summer holiday. It might be said that nothing really happens, but that would be to miss the point. LIFE happens, and these wonderful, sympathetic characters will tug at your heart. I certainly was choked up several times. A lovely book with just the right narrator.

life-affirming and magical

I bought it only because Kazuo Ishiguro highly recommended it. It is everything as he said. The scope is incredibly small: a lower-middle class English family’s 2-week vacation at a modest seaside hotel. I cannot believe how tender each of the characters were treated, their most delicate feelings well drawn out, and how much empathy the author has for each of the characters’ everyday struggles and aspirations without indulging in sentimentality. It truly feels that I was on this vacation with them, and laughed and enjoyed and heart ached with them. I am sure I will read it over and over in the years to come, especially when I need a break!

Escape to a simpler time.

Quiet and lovely. One of those books where nothing really happens, but you get to know people in a deep and meaningful way.

A perceptive account of a middle-class family on their September holiday

A finely drawn, thoughtful account of a middle class English family and their day-to-day Fortnite add a beach resort in England. Through the reflections of each individual person, the reader is introduced to their private traumas, secret thoughts, and outreach is to family and friends. The narrator lens her own cast to the mood, which I found a trifle overdone, but overall, very well-suited to the story. There’s a slight melancholy cast to this unsentimental study, but the author is deeply affectionate towards his characters, as well. I’m glad I listened to it!

A Family Summer Holiday We All Can Relate To

It's a very simple story: a family's trip to the seaside both invigorates them but also helps them process their experiences and disappointments in ways that help them progress. But it's so cozy and cheering that everyone can relate to the story in some way or another.

We all have a Bognor in some form that's special to us. My family has been visiting Chincoteague Island on the Eastern Shore of Virginia every summer since I was small and we all love the various rituals and traditions that come with that vacation. From driving across the rural background of Eastern Shore Maryland to long days biking or feasting on seafood, the days spent on vacation bring some refreshment back after a long year of work or school. And though my family doesn't have a single place for our memories (the places we've stayed at have changed over the years), the place we've been staying at the last few years and the one from my earliest childhood ring a lot of Seaview.

I liked everyone in this book from nervous Mrs. Stevens to shy and uncertain Mary. Probably, Dick Stevens was the most interesting to me. I can sympathize with (truthfully, I think most of us can too) being disappointed by adult life and not knowing how to make ourselves happy. That he decides to try seeing his current job as a stepping stone to something better is very mature of him, as well as deciding that though his old school wasn't "smart" it's worth being proud about and encouraging others to be too. I only hope that he did manage to become the architect he decided he wanted to be and did well in his profession.

I listened to his book about two months before our annual beach vacation and can say happily it's nostalgic in a simple sort of way. It really reminded me of E. B. White's Essay "Once More to the Lake" which also similarly discourses how experiences of the past and present intersect when it comes to beloved places. This book would be the perfect one to listen to on or up to your vacation this summer and hopefully you enjoy it (and your vacation) as much as the Stevens do!