Other People's Houses

In Other People’s Houses publishing legend Hilary McPhee exchanges one hemisphere for another. Fleeing the aftermath of a failed marriage, Hilary McPhee embarks on a writing project in the Middle East for a member of the Hashemite royal family, a man she greatly respects. There she finds herself faced with different kinds of exile, new kinds of banishment. From apartments in Cortona and Amman and an attic in London, McPhee watches other women managing magnificently alone as she flounders through the mire of Extreme Loneliness. Other People's Houses is a brutally honest memoir, funny, sad, full of insights into worlds to which she was given privileged access, and of the friendships that sustained her. And ultimately, of course, it is a story of returning home, of picking up the pieces, and facing the music as her house and her life takes on new shapes. “What is the instinct to flee? When home offers no comfort McPhee seeks solace in Europe and the Middle East. With an archaeological eye and penetrating intelligence she excavates her own history, politics in the Middle East, life-sustaining friendships and the quiet despair of loneliness. An engrossing and affecting memoir. McPhee is fierce, frank, tender and resolute.” CARRIE TIFFANY