About The Widow's Tale.

In 1992 Antonia gave up her Fleet Street career – she was Daily Express TV critic for three years in the late eighties – when she had her second child Ella. She wrote her first novel in 1993 and disappointed by the tepid reaction of London publishers decided, Nicola Horlick style, not to take any more nonsense, and underwrote her first novel’s publication with established Midlands publisher Gracewing.

To wet your appetite ...

"West London in June ... who on earth would choose to live in this crazy place but the mad, the bad and the super rich?

Harriet Gosse is beautiful, talented and alone. After five years of coping with the death of her soap star husband, and the demands of her small son and new foreign language business, she finally feels in control. So why does meeting Richard Longbridge, a handsome Mayfair gallery owner, make her feel so uneasy? Is he "the man of her dreams", or just another feckless male like her brilliant artist father?

Set in London during the long hot recession-hit summer of 1990 this hilarious romantic comedy of modern love and middle-class manners invites us into a world of eccentric artists, debt ridden galleries, failing public schools and glitzy Television studios. Events unfold with breathtaking speed as Harriet finds herself forced to choose between her past imperfect and her future.

In this, her first novel ex Fleet Street journalist Antonia Swinson introduces us to a wealth of extraordinary characters, whose lives are played out against closely observed backgrounds in London, New York and the Home Counties.

If you're ready for more then brace yourself and ...

Sample The Widow's Tale. [Available NOW]

Read Chapter 1 and Chapter 2 of The Widow's Tale ... here on The Antonia Swinson Website.

Selected Views of The Widows's Tale ...

Allan Prior • Daily Mail book reviewer & creator of Howard’s Way and The Charmer

"The Widow’s Tale had me smiling more than anything I have read in a long while ... compares with the best of Fay Weldon."

Martyn Goff • writer, critic and administrator of the Booker Prize

"I thoroughly enjoyed The Widow’s Tale. It has got narrative power, pace, humour, wit, charm and a very sharp perception. What is more Antonia Swinson succeeds in making a landscape of characters who might have been types or clichés into real people. A delight to read."

Mavis Cheek • author of Janice Gentle Gets Sexy

"Wonderful ... really sparkle: a jolly romp through the vagaries of Volvo life."

Sue Peart • Deputy Editor The Mail on Sunday You Magazine

"A surefire bestseller ."

Actress Susan Penhaligon • 'Heart of the Country' and 'A Fine Romance'

"I read The Widow's Tale in one go. I put it down thinking that it would make great television. Antonia Swinson seems naturally to think in scenes. And it is so funny."

End of Document • return to top

This document forms part of The Antonia Swinson Website • © 1999
Visit us again on http://www.antoniaswinson.co.uk or e-mail antonia swinson

"Notting Hill"


"Antonia lived in Notting Hill, for several years in the mid eighties. She and her husband Alan married in St John's Ladbroke Grove, the local church there, in 1984. In those days, as now, the whole area breathed writers and actors and artists.

In The Widow's Tale, the heroine Harriet's office is above a gallery in the Portobello Road, a stone's throw from
Hugh Grant's bookshop. This is still Antonia's favourite part of London, and it is soon to be everyone else's too, after what should be the biggest film release this summer.

(detail from cover illustration)