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The Palm House
Laura Miller and Edmund Putnam have been friends for a long time. Theirs is a happy meeting of minds, with long evenings spent huddled in an ancient pub by the Thames, where they share office gossip, reflect on their teenage passions, and lament the state of the world.
Recently, though, Putnam has been harder to reach: he has lost his father, and the magazine to which he has dedicated his life has been hijacked by an insufferable new editor, Simon ‘call me Shove’ Halfpenny.
Laura has her own problems: with a prickly mother and a tricky past, and in a beautiful and indifferent city, her day-to-day life is precarious. But as Putnam starts to sink into despondency, she must try to bring him back.
A novel of enduring friendships and small mercies, The Palm House offers us Gwendoline Riley’s trademark keen observation and wit, and leaves us - somehow - with a curious sense of possibility.
Recently, though, Putnam has been harder to reach: he has lost his father, and the magazine to which he has dedicated his life has been hijacked by an insufferable new editor, Simon ‘call me Shove’ Halfpenny.
Laura has her own problems: with a prickly mother and a tricky past, and in a beautiful and indifferent city, her day-to-day life is precarious. But as Putnam starts to sink into despondency, she must try to bring him back.
A novel of enduring friendships and small mercies, The Palm House offers us Gwendoline Riley’s trademark keen observation and wit, and leaves us - somehow - with a curious sense of possibility.
224 pages, Hardcover
First published April 2, 2026
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 209 reviews
May 28, 2026
Disappointing. The novel tries very hard to sound intellectual, sophisticated and refined, but for me it lacked real depth or emotional weight.
The writing reminded me of James Salter’s in the sense that it focuses heavily on conversations and atmosphere, yet it never truly shines.
The characters were all unlikable.
Veganism and vegetarianism were mentioned as if they automatically made one more enlightened or superior. Instead of adding meaning to the story, those details often felt self-congratulatory and pretentious.
What in the name of all the food gods is a 'vegan sausage roll' anyway? 🙄
Someone the characters know is diagnosed with a disease and during their conversation one of them questions the cause of the illness saying that she (the ill person) was even a vegetarian. What? 😣
Sentences such as "He had a cold, smooth voice, like a heavy pair of scissors cutting rich fabric." and "I assessed my hangover. It wasn't too bad. I felt a bit like a blown egg." were the cherries on top! 🤯🤕
For me it felt the novel was more concerned with appearing intelligent and tasteful than with saying anything meaningful.
The writing reminded me of James Salter’s in the sense that it focuses heavily on conversations and atmosphere, yet it never truly shines.
The characters were all unlikable.
Veganism and vegetarianism were mentioned as if they automatically made one more enlightened or superior. Instead of adding meaning to the story, those details often felt self-congratulatory and pretentious.
What in the name of all the food gods is a 'vegan sausage roll' anyway? 🙄
Someone the characters know is diagnosed with a disease and during their conversation one of them questions the cause of the illness saying that she (the ill person) was even a vegetarian. What? 😣
Sentences such as "He had a cold, smooth voice, like a heavy pair of scissors cutting rich fabric." and "I assessed my hangover. It wasn't too bad. I felt a bit like a blown egg." were the cherries on top! 🤯🤕
For me it felt the novel was more concerned with appearing intelligent and tasteful than with saying anything meaningful.
May 26, 2026
Friendship between a man and a woman, especially an older, hetero man and younger, hetero woman, is something I’ve rarely seen explored in fiction – unless their friendship morphs into romance and/or exploitation. But the enduring bond between Laura Miller approaching forty and Edmund Putnam approaching fifty, is front and centre in Gwendoline Riley’s beautifully-observed novel. Laura and Putnam’s relationship isn’t flawless but it’s a welcome refuge from a challenging, sometimes menacing world. With a deliberate nod to Our Mutual Friend, Riley’s opening plays on that contrast. It’s 2017, Laura and Putnam are having drinks in a riverside pub near London Bridge. Outside murky, polluted skies reflect ongoing climate change. But retreating deep inside, Laura and Putnam can focus on each other, sharing a packet of crisps, split open in, what was, a commonplace ritual of communion. In scenes inspired by Cusk’s Outline, Laura adopts the role of listener as Putnam recites a litany of grievances.
With minimal brush strokes Riley establishes Putnam’s history: ongoing devotion to the arts; a difficult time at a “rough” school with few friends. 25 years at Sequence magazine, one of a tight-knit group of like-minded people. For Putnam this pub’s a potent reminder – personal memory sites are prominent throughout for Putnam, and for Laura, adding a wistful, Proustian flavour to Riley’s narrative. Once-familiar London landscapes have radically altered since Putnam’s youth, now he’s facing seismic change. Sequence has a new editor, a brash “company man” nicknamed “Shove”; he’s moved over from a sports title with plans to shake things up. Shove’s rumoured to be based on Stephen “Stig of the Dump” Abell controversial former editor of the Times Literary Supplement or TLS. Abell arrived from red-top tabloid The Sun – where he gained notoriety supporting an exceptionally provocative, anti-migrant piece by right-wing commentator Katie Hopkins. Riley’s written for the TLS, her ex-husband also worked there. But whatever the sources, Riley’s depiction of events at Sequence forms a persuasive portrait of a rampantly commercialised publishing industry. Now Putnam’s abruptly quit, falling back on an inheritance after his dad’s recent death.
Riley’s narrative’s fragmented, restlessly shifting around in time in keeping with the workings of memory. Laura thinks back to childhood in the Wirral with her grandmother and divorced mother. Their distant, benign neglect left her introverted and self-conscious. At 15 a crush on minor celeb Chris Patrick promised longed-for affection. It became a classically abusive grooming scenario with Patrick a kind of larger-than-life “Russell Brand” figure. Patrick poses Laura like a doll, films them in bed together then sends her off with an STI to remember him by. It’s a chilling episode made more so by Riley’s matter-of-fact delivery influenced by Annie Ernaux’s The Happening. Laura meets Putnam when she’s studying in London. Their bond a constant countering precarity, they’re united by uneasy nostalgia and disillusionment; hyperaware chance can alter the course of a life – from the people they meet to Laura’s unexpected inheritance, just enough for a small flat.
Riley wanted to write about a community of “frightened people” branching out to include the Sequence crowd – Laura’s an honorary member at their gatherings. Some of this tracks back to Riley’s fascination with the houseboat community in Penelope Fitzgerald’s Offshore clinging to a semblance of an ordered, civilised life despite all odds. But Riley’s characters seem more resilient, managing to carve out spaces of sanctuary, however uncertain. Putnam’s casually-named Cat also gestures to Fitzgerald’s indomitable Stripey – Riley considers cats essential to human happiness and there’s a reverence for animals underlying her story glimpsed in Laura’s vegan beliefs. I wasn’t sure about this one at first, it seemed very different from previous more introspective novels. But it slowly won me over, it’s an impressively intricate piece, incredibly disciplined. A convincing, relatable slice of contemporary life. Riley manages to address weighty issues in an admirably subtle way: capitalism, relentless commodification, the strategies needed to navigate everyday perils against a backdrop of looming climate change. Riley’s minor characters don’t exactly rival Dickens’s but they’re striking too: eccentric, deftly drawn, for Laura, and to a lesser extent Putnam, dangerously mercurial.
Thanks to Netgalley and publisher Picador for an ARC
With minimal brush strokes Riley establishes Putnam’s history: ongoing devotion to the arts; a difficult time at a “rough” school with few friends. 25 years at Sequence magazine, one of a tight-knit group of like-minded people. For Putnam this pub’s a potent reminder – personal memory sites are prominent throughout for Putnam, and for Laura, adding a wistful, Proustian flavour to Riley’s narrative. Once-familiar London landscapes have radically altered since Putnam’s youth, now he’s facing seismic change. Sequence has a new editor, a brash “company man” nicknamed “Shove”; he’s moved over from a sports title with plans to shake things up. Shove’s rumoured to be based on Stephen “Stig of the Dump” Abell controversial former editor of the Times Literary Supplement or TLS. Abell arrived from red-top tabloid The Sun – where he gained notoriety supporting an exceptionally provocative, anti-migrant piece by right-wing commentator Katie Hopkins. Riley’s written for the TLS, her ex-husband also worked there. But whatever the sources, Riley’s depiction of events at Sequence forms a persuasive portrait of a rampantly commercialised publishing industry. Now Putnam’s abruptly quit, falling back on an inheritance after his dad’s recent death.
Riley’s narrative’s fragmented, restlessly shifting around in time in keeping with the workings of memory. Laura thinks back to childhood in the Wirral with her grandmother and divorced mother. Their distant, benign neglect left her introverted and self-conscious. At 15 a crush on minor celeb Chris Patrick promised longed-for affection. It became a classically abusive grooming scenario with Patrick a kind of larger-than-life “Russell Brand” figure. Patrick poses Laura like a doll, films them in bed together then sends her off with an STI to remember him by. It’s a chilling episode made more so by Riley’s matter-of-fact delivery influenced by Annie Ernaux’s The Happening. Laura meets Putnam when she’s studying in London. Their bond a constant countering precarity, they’re united by uneasy nostalgia and disillusionment; hyperaware chance can alter the course of a life – from the people they meet to Laura’s unexpected inheritance, just enough for a small flat.
Riley wanted to write about a community of “frightened people” branching out to include the Sequence crowd – Laura’s an honorary member at their gatherings. Some of this tracks back to Riley’s fascination with the houseboat community in Penelope Fitzgerald’s Offshore clinging to a semblance of an ordered, civilised life despite all odds. But Riley’s characters seem more resilient, managing to carve out spaces of sanctuary, however uncertain. Putnam’s casually-named Cat also gestures to Fitzgerald’s indomitable Stripey – Riley considers cats essential to human happiness and there’s a reverence for animals underlying her story glimpsed in Laura’s vegan beliefs. I wasn’t sure about this one at first, it seemed very different from previous more introspective novels. But it slowly won me over, it’s an impressively intricate piece, incredibly disciplined. A convincing, relatable slice of contemporary life. Riley manages to address weighty issues in an admirably subtle way: capitalism, relentless commodification, the strategies needed to navigate everyday perils against a backdrop of looming climate change. Riley’s minor characters don’t exactly rival Dickens’s but they’re striking too: eccentric, deftly drawn, for Laura, and to a lesser extent Putnam, dangerously mercurial.
Thanks to Netgalley and publisher Picador for an ARC
March 15, 2026
I did look into that, when I got in. I looked at prices for Paris and for Amsterdam. It was an easy thing to talk myself out of, though, when there was still so much I hadn’t seen in London. Putnam and I kept meaning to go to the Cabinet War Rooms. He often said, too, that I should go with him and his father one weekend to visit the ancient cycads in the Kew Gardens Palm House
The Palm House is Gwendoline Riley’s seventh novel and one that while it doesn’t really stretch the boundaries of her work, adds to an impressive oeuvre.
The first person narrator here is Laura, who as often with Riley’s narrators is too busy dissecting the life of her friends and her parents to analyse her own, which emerges in various vignettes, leaving that exercise to the reader. In my review of First Love I said: "It is both a difficulty with but also a strength of the novel, that it is quite hard to piece together Neve’s life, house moves and relationships, but that it also doesn't really matter," which I commented in my review of could be ported over simply by substituting Aislinn for Neve, and here the same would work for Laura.
The novel opens, although not dated, in October 2017 and the dust red skies over London from the Storm Ophelia sand storm, but this is rather a backdrop to the narrator’s conversation with her closest friend, Putnam (clearly his preferred sobriquet rather than Ed or Edward), aged 49 and older than Laura. Putnam has worked at a cultural magazine, Sequence, for 25 years, almost his entire career. Some months earlier a new editor was appointed by the publishing firm that owns the publication, after the death of the long-standing previous editor, and his desire to inject some modern approaches to the rather traditional, 50+ year old magazine (his vision is ‘a sort of London version of the New Yorker’) have gone down badly with the staff, and indeed with the loyal readership (‘of course we want to bring them along if we can’ retorts the new editor), and Putnam has resigned.
The narrator also introduces us to her rather quirky mother (a Riley staple) and the contrast to Putnam is striking:
I once tried to describe my mother's particular way of talking to Putnam. I was trying to nail down something about the mixture of hyperbole and deprecation, about a world where sod's law was the natural law. Putnam, it turned out, was the wrong person to deliberate with.
'Northern,' he said.
'Eh?'
'The word you're looking for is Northern.'
'Everything's a laff,' he said. 'Nothing's to be taken seriously. Nothing's worthy of the slightest bit of respect. Or thought. Nothing can be sat with for even one second. Instead we get this annihilating flippancy. I'm sorry, Laura, I loathe it. It's everything I've fought against for my whole life.'
And she also covers, inter Alia, her absent father, and her brief relationship with a rakish actor, one who indeed seemed to be acting in real-life the part of a rakish actor.
But the novel’s real power is in the portrayal of Laura and Putnam’s friendship as well as their self-limiting view that they don’t deserve anything more, their life confined to a small circle of friends and a relatively small part of South London (Putnam works in Tooley Street and lives close by in Shad Thames), Laura’s rejection (see the opening quote) of a friend’s suggestion that she might eg try a holiday, even a brief city break, rather telling (and they don’t even make it out to Kew and the Palm House).
For now, my new habit was to look around the Tate during my lunch hour. I crossed the river at Vauxhall Bridge. There was the knock-knock sound of my boots on Milbank, the sudden wind, the large leaves cart-wheeling along the promenade.
After work, if I wanted to think about the future, I might have a drink in one of those dark-wood, etched-glass Victorian pubs near Pimlico, sitting on a wobbling stool by the wall.
Thanks to the publisher via Netgalley for the ARC
The Palm House is Gwendoline Riley’s seventh novel and one that while it doesn’t really stretch the boundaries of her work, adds to an impressive oeuvre.
The first person narrator here is Laura, who as often with Riley’s narrators is too busy dissecting the life of her friends and her parents to analyse her own, which emerges in various vignettes, leaving that exercise to the reader. In my review of First Love I said: "It is both a difficulty with but also a strength of the novel, that it is quite hard to piece together Neve’s life, house moves and relationships, but that it also doesn't really matter," which I commented in my review of could be ported over simply by substituting Aislinn for Neve, and here the same would work for Laura.
The novel opens, although not dated, in October 2017 and the dust red skies over London from the Storm Ophelia sand storm, but this is rather a backdrop to the narrator’s conversation with her closest friend, Putnam (clearly his preferred sobriquet rather than Ed or Edward), aged 49 and older than Laura. Putnam has worked at a cultural magazine, Sequence, for 25 years, almost his entire career. Some months earlier a new editor was appointed by the publishing firm that owns the publication, after the death of the long-standing previous editor, and his desire to inject some modern approaches to the rather traditional, 50+ year old magazine (his vision is ‘a sort of London version of the New Yorker’) have gone down badly with the staff, and indeed with the loyal readership (‘of course we want to bring them along if we can’ retorts the new editor), and Putnam has resigned.
The narrator also introduces us to her rather quirky mother (a Riley staple) and the contrast to Putnam is striking:
I once tried to describe my mother's particular way of talking to Putnam. I was trying to nail down something about the mixture of hyperbole and deprecation, about a world where sod's law was the natural law. Putnam, it turned out, was the wrong person to deliberate with.
'Northern,' he said.
'Eh?'
'The word you're looking for is Northern.'
'Everything's a laff,' he said. 'Nothing's to be taken seriously. Nothing's worthy of the slightest bit of respect. Or thought. Nothing can be sat with for even one second. Instead we get this annihilating flippancy. I'm sorry, Laura, I loathe it. It's everything I've fought against for my whole life.'
And she also covers, inter Alia, her absent father, and her brief relationship with a rakish actor, one who indeed seemed to be acting in real-life the part of a rakish actor.
But the novel’s real power is in the portrayal of Laura and Putnam’s friendship as well as their self-limiting view that they don’t deserve anything more, their life confined to a small circle of friends and a relatively small part of South London (Putnam works in Tooley Street and lives close by in Shad Thames), Laura’s rejection (see the opening quote) of a friend’s suggestion that she might eg try a holiday, even a brief city break, rather telling (and they don’t even make it out to Kew and the Palm House).
For now, my new habit was to look around the Tate during my lunch hour. I crossed the river at Vauxhall Bridge. There was the knock-knock sound of my boots on Milbank, the sudden wind, the large leaves cart-wheeling along the promenade.
After work, if I wanted to think about the future, I might have a drink in one of those dark-wood, etched-glass Victorian pubs near Pimlico, sitting on a wobbling stool by the wall.
Thanks to the publisher via Netgalley for the ARC
May 10, 2026
Oh she's doing a caricature of a British comedian. Great, how am I going to figure out who this is? You know it's going to be some guy from the 80s that no one in North America has ever heard of––oh wait lol it's russell brand
Review of advance copy received from Netgalley
The Palm House is only the second novel that I've read by Gwendoline Riley. It is a much more passive and thoughtful novel than My Phantoms. For me it was missing impact in a lot of areas but if you read it as a look at the lives of ordinary people growing older and coming to terms with inevitable changes then it does exactly what I should. I think, after the beginning when dealing with Laura's chaotic (and often dangerous) childhood, I expected more surprises.
However we follow the course of Laura's life working for Sequence, a publication which caters to "young fogeys" and where she becomes friends with Putnam whose nose is put out of joint following the arrival of a new editor who wants to shake things up.
The Palm House is a gentle novel with its characters weaving in and out of each other's lives as they try to find careers and homes where they can be happy - or at least live without mould and caterpillars.
I enjoyed it to a point even if it felt much more disjointed than "Phantoms". I still need to read more by this author. Her prose is exquisite.
Thankyou to Netgalley and Picador for the digital review copy.
However we follow the course of Laura's life working for Sequence, a publication which caters to "young fogeys" and where she becomes friends with Putnam whose nose is put out of joint following the arrival of a new editor who wants to shake things up.
The Palm House is a gentle novel with its characters weaving in and out of each other's lives as they try to find careers and homes where they can be happy - or at least live without mould and caterpillars.
I enjoyed it to a point even if it felt much more disjointed than "Phantoms". I still need to read more by this author. Her prose is exquisite.
Thankyou to Netgalley and Picador for the digital review copy.
Read
April 29, 2026Riley is a master prose stylist. Her work is dark, perceptive, ultimately focused in realism. In all her books, especially this one, she doesn’t tell you who the characters are - she shows you who they are through their dialogue and actions. She understands her characters to their core. The prose is also deceptively simple. There’s so much bubbling under the surface if you pause and take the time to think about how she is presenting information to you. This is why she is one of my favourite authors and why her works always have a lasting impact on me. The Palm House was no exception. As I finished the last page I was like, hmmm… but then little details of the text could not escape me as I further analyzed the narrator and her relationships within the novel. I found that the relationships she examines to be interesting, complicated, and new to what she has done before, but also very familiar.
This is worth the read for anyone who has read Riley before, but I still think her best work is found in My Phantoms and First Love and where readers should first start if they are unfamiliar with her work.
This is worth the read for anyone who has read Riley before, but I still think her best work is found in My Phantoms and First Love and where readers should first start if they are unfamiliar with her work.
Review of advance copy received from Netgalley
The Palm House, the latest novel by Gwendoline Riley, is another striking slice of contemporary life, of a woman - this time Laura Miller - with a complex relationship with her mother and of her friendship with an older man, Edward Putnam (just Putnam to his friends). He is a long term writer with a magazine, Sequence, but about to be shoved out by a new, younger editor. Laura is also adrift in her own way, and the friendship between these two souls forms the backbone of this novel.
I have long admired Riley's fiction - I came onboard with her debut Cold Water in 2002 - and have read everything she has published since. The Palm House treads her familiar themes, but never feels like a repition. From the beautiful opening sentences, Riley grips in a way few manage; she has a sharp eye, and a scapel-sharp style of prose that gets right to the beating heart of her characters. If you've not read her before, this is a great place to start. If you've liked her previous works, this one will be a treat.
Thank you to Netgalley and the publishers for the ARC.
I have long admired Riley's fiction - I came onboard with her debut Cold Water in 2002 - and have read everything she has published since. The Palm House treads her familiar themes, but never feels like a repition. From the beautiful opening sentences, Riley grips in a way few manage; she has a sharp eye, and a scapel-sharp style of prose that gets right to the beating heart of her characters. If you've not read her before, this is a great place to start. If you've liked her previous works, this one will be a treat.
Thank you to Netgalley and the publishers for the ARC.
June 8, 2026
4.5
My first Riley won’t be my last. Her knife-sharp dialogue paired with some really unique conversational structure was a delight. I’m a big fan of middle-age quiet-crises and nobody does moody melancholy better than the Brits.
“Never mind carrying a cross, it felt at times as if Putnam had decided to wear a coffin when he came out for a drink. It was as if he were wearing this coffin and daring us all to say something about it. I imagined a coffin propped up near our table and Putnam occasionally bashing open the lid to shout,
‘Don’t mind me!’
‘Don’t mind me in my coffin, will you?’”
My first Riley won’t be my last. Her knife-sharp dialogue paired with some really unique conversational structure was a delight. I’m a big fan of middle-age quiet-crises and nobody does moody melancholy better than the Brits.
“Never mind carrying a cross, it felt at times as if Putnam had decided to wear a coffin when he came out for a drink. It was as if he were wearing this coffin and daring us all to say something about it. I imagined a coffin propped up near our table and Putnam occasionally bashing open the lid to shout,
‘Don’t mind me!’
‘Don’t mind me in my coffin, will you?’”
May 12, 2026
So either I'm crazy, or everyone else is crazy. I read this book after seeing Sarah Jessica Parker rave about it on Instagram. Being a Booker Prize judge, I figured she had good taste. I was wrong.
I didn't enjoy the manner in which this book was written. It took slice of life to an extreme by giving very little actual substance or background to attach to the characters. The reader is a fly on the wall, given intermittent and thin context to barely piece together what's going on, who each character is, and why it's important. It assumes that the reader cares a lot about the characters and wants to unpack every single bit of dialogue for latent meaning, but frankly, I don't want to do that for the length of an entire book. Don't get me wrong, I like some ambiguity in my books, and I don't like when everything is spelled out for me like I'm a child. But when each sentence is ripe for dissection, and I need to sit and think about every page for 5 min to understand what's happened, I'm not enjoying myself. I'm confused and uninterested. I was very close to DNFing, and I honestly should have.
What I will say is that I did enjoy the portions where Laura explored her relationship with her mother. Those were compelling and nuanced vignettes. Her relationship with Putnam and his adventure in kamikaze-ing his life was what originally enticed me to start reading. I love books about complex and imperfect friendship dynamics. Ultimately, it didn't provide a substantive exploration into anyone's dynamics.
I didn't enjoy the manner in which this book was written. It took slice of life to an extreme by giving very little actual substance or background to attach to the characters. The reader is a fly on the wall, given intermittent and thin context to barely piece together what's going on, who each character is, and why it's important. It assumes that the reader cares a lot about the characters and wants to unpack every single bit of dialogue for latent meaning, but frankly, I don't want to do that for the length of an entire book. Don't get me wrong, I like some ambiguity in my books, and I don't like when everything is spelled out for me like I'm a child. But when each sentence is ripe for dissection, and I need to sit and think about every page for 5 min to understand what's happened, I'm not enjoying myself. I'm confused and uninterested. I was very close to DNFing, and I honestly should have.
What I will say is that I did enjoy the portions where Laura explored her relationship with her mother. Those were compelling and nuanced vignettes. Her relationship with Putnam and his adventure in kamikaze-ing his life was what originally enticed me to start reading. I love books about complex and imperfect friendship dynamics. Ultimately, it didn't provide a substantive exploration into anyone's dynamics.
June 13, 2026
Bit meandering, but I loved the breezy, anecdotal style and the pitch perfect dialogue that made me chuckle quite a bit. Really enjoyed.
May 21, 2026
This was my first Gwendoline Riley novel and I admired the precision and focus of her writing style.
Read
June 13, 2026People like Christian Lorentzen raving about this is so funny, it's like that NY Mag article about how hot and stylish a certain Knicks backup is, by a writer who looks exactly like the backup in question. Except instead of looks, it's lifestyle—a freelancer/literary orbit drinks circuit denizen praising their double.
Sort of downstream-feeling from Cusk or Lerner, with much less successful art-world characters, making no great claims on the world or themselves, thinking more about the day-to-day than big figures or concepts. Basically nothing happens, but the all-too-familiar vibe intrigued me and I read it quickly. I'm not sure what I think of it on the whole. There were many times I felt like she just nailed a feeling or a type, but I'm not clear what it all adds up to.
Sort of downstream-feeling from Cusk or Lerner, with much less successful art-world characters, making no great claims on the world or themselves, thinking more about the day-to-day than big figures or concepts. Basically nothing happens, but the all-too-familiar vibe intrigued me and I read it quickly. I'm not sure what I think of it on the whole. There were many times I felt like she just nailed a feeling or a type, but I'm not clear what it all adds up to.
April 21, 2026
James Wood, a critic I like, said of Riley: “We truly see her characters, in their descriptive nakedness, alive and horridly vivid.” True. There’s something skinless about Riley’s writing of her characters’ emotional states. She expresses *feeling* so well. In her sharp, carefully textured, and beautifully paced sentences, Riley gives the impression of a cold eye holding things up and exposing them in the sun’s bright glare. It can feel merciless. It’s thrilling.
Actually, Riley’s previous novel My Phantoms was even more severe in this regard, though that made sense considering the relationships in that book. The Palm House is less bleak, but it still hits its target; it’s still full of clean punches and crisp slaps. I just love her writing—her control. Her ear for speech is uncommonly good. I feel safe in her hands.
This is easily one of my standout reads of the year so far. Very addictive. I’m generally a slow reader, but this was so supple and nimble that I simply breezed through it.
On the strength of just two books, Riley has become one of my favourite contemporary novelists. I’m more eager than ever now to read First Love.
Actually, Riley’s previous novel My Phantoms was even more severe in this regard, though that made sense considering the relationships in that book. The Palm House is less bleak, but it still hits its target; it’s still full of clean punches and crisp slaps. I just love her writing—her control. Her ear for speech is uncommonly good. I feel safe in her hands.
This is easily one of my standout reads of the year so far. Very addictive. I’m generally a slow reader, but this was so supple and nimble that I simply breezed through it.
On the strength of just two books, Riley has become one of my favourite contemporary novelists. I’m more eager than ever now to read First Love.
April 29, 2026
At the time of writing I haven’t actually finished reading this book, but I’m in a fairly foul and wound-up mood at the moment, so let’s try an experiment. If you’re reading this, it means I’ve made it through the last 53 pages and they haven’t changed my mind.
*
I read this book over three days in a haze of indifference. Even by the standards of anecdotal realism this is downright trivial stuff: thin, unpressured, and becalmed. I know we live in an age of runaway praise inflation, but reading the backflap of this book makes me feel like the cuckoos have taken over. Are you telling me that this really “confirms Riley’s position among the finest novelists working today”? I’m supposed to believe that this “confirms Riley as one of Britain’s best?” Are you seriously telling me that “nobody writes better?” Get a fucking grip, because this sort of hyperbole just embarrasses all of us. Look, it’s all perfectly well-balanced and lean, but come on. Make it make sense.
Still, all power to her for winning the Windham–Campbell Prize. A hundred and fifty big ones is a life-changing amount of money to a writer of literary fiction in these illiterate, shitbox times.
*
I read this book over three days in a haze of indifference. Even by the standards of anecdotal realism this is downright trivial stuff: thin, unpressured, and becalmed. I know we live in an age of runaway praise inflation, but reading the backflap of this book makes me feel like the cuckoos have taken over. Are you telling me that this really “confirms Riley’s position among the finest novelists working today”? I’m supposed to believe that this “confirms Riley as one of Britain’s best?” Are you seriously telling me that “nobody writes better?” Get a fucking grip, because this sort of hyperbole just embarrasses all of us. Look, it’s all perfectly well-balanced and lean, but come on. Make it make sense.
Still, all power to her for winning the Windham–Campbell Prize. A hundred and fifty big ones is a life-changing amount of money to a writer of literary fiction in these illiterate, shitbox times.
April 8, 2026
Somehow this story of two London friends - Laura and Edmund - was too convoluted, two cold to make me invested in any of the characters. Sad, considering how much I'd enjoyed Gwendoline Riley's previous books.
Want to Read
April 25, 2026I bought a copy and it was slightly damaged and I'm mildly devastated about it, but I'm being so brave <3
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May 7, 2026
One of those books for which a star system is particularly inadequate. Carefully describes a constellation of relationships (especially between men and women) in a pocket of literary/artistic London, with the center of gravity being the friendship between the narrator, roughly 40 year old Laura, and the decade or so older Putnam. Very little happens in a traditional plotty sense; it’s slice-of-life for precisely rendered people in a precisely rendered set of places, with immaculate dialogue and a brisk prose style that makes it hard to put down, if you’re into it. Not going to be for everyone, but it was very much for me.
April 7, 2026
I was in pub with Laura and Putnam. We had a good time.
May 10, 2026
v v good ok clearly i need to get on my gwen riley shit
June 4, 2026
I love the way Gwendoline Riley writes. I can’t say this was at all what I expected. But I loved it, and really loved Putnam and Laura and seeing tiny glimpses of their family, friends, and coworkers that come and go in their lives. And Riley really nails complex mother / daughter relationships with a lot of love and humor. I wanted to hear more from Putnam, my only semi-complaint. But I still give it 5 stars.
May 17, 2026
This meandered to much for me to really enjoy it. Easy to read but lacked focus. 2 stars
May 23, 2026
Didn't hit for me. Writing needs to be really good if the book is truly about nothing.
March 7, 2026
Brilliant slices of life, with magnificently captured dialogue. Not really a novel.
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
April 24, 2026
Gwendoline Riley is one of my new favorite writers. She has a remarkable gift for painting vivid characters, even minor, one-scene wonders, via their gestures, their affectations, their actual social status vs. the status they're performing for the world.
It's a pleasure to spend time, however brief, with her prose.
Please, people, try out a real novel for a change. It's embarrassing to see the low score and readership numbers on a site called Goodreads. The Palm House is half as long—and several times as good—as any of the 4 or 5 books Freida McFadden willwrite type in 2026 alone.
It's a pleasure to spend time, however brief, with her prose.
Please, people, try out a real novel for a change. It's embarrassing to see the low score and readership numbers on a site called Goodreads. The Palm House is half as long—and several times as good—as any of the 4 or 5 books Freida McFadden will
October 9, 2025
gwendoline riley cuts so close to the bone. utter excellence.
May 24, 2026
More than four years ago I read and enjoyed Gwendoline Riley’s last book, My Phantoms, which was all about a relationship between mother and daughter. Her latest novel, The Palm House, has a similar relationship theme, with the narrator, Laura Miller, and her mother both featuring. But this time much of the focus of attention is on a relationship between Laura and Edmund Putnam. For most of the book he is referred to simply as Putnam. It is a platonic relationship, revolving mainly around work.
Laura and Putnam have known each other for years and have worked together writing articles for magazines in London. While Laura has freelanced, Putnam has worked on the same magazine, Sequence, for thirty years. The arrival of a monstrous new editor has forced Putnam to resign his job. He is now both angry and bitter about the whole situation, as well as generally morose.
Riley paints a wonderful portrait of Putnam, languishing in his own misery and not doing anything about it.
In section 2 we suddenly dart back in time to when the narrator is a young girl. We see holidays to Majorca and Corfu. We see a house shared with mother and grandmother in which the three individuals didn’t really talk, there were merely shouted instructions up and down the stairs. The level of observation within these pages is exquisite. The refusal to try a little of someone else’s meal, the insistence, the refusal, back and forth. Wonderfully observed.
Later in the book, Laura’s mother acquires a boyfriend. This leads us down the path to a good deal of humour. The man’s names was David.
And about a page later:
I love the humour of it, the reality not far removed from events in my own life, echoes of things that people would say. A very enjoyable read.
Laura and Putnam have known each other for years and have worked together writing articles for magazines in London. While Laura has freelanced, Putnam has worked on the same magazine, Sequence, for thirty years. The arrival of a monstrous new editor has forced Putnam to resign his job. He is now both angry and bitter about the whole situation, as well as generally morose.
‘You don’t get it,’ he’d say, miserably, or, ‘How could you understand?’
‘It’s all right for you,’ he said, to me. ‘You’ve never cared about anything in your life.’
I used to feel, at those times, talking to him, as if I were trying to climb a steep sand dune, while he stood on the crest: exultant in his misery.
Riley paints a wonderful portrait of Putnam, languishing in his own misery and not doing anything about it.
‘Do you know how many offers I’ve had?’
‘You haven’t applied for anything,’ I said.
‘Not one,’ he said, triumphantly. ‘Not a dicky bird.’
“You haven’t applied for anything!’ I said, again, as if that were relevant to the point he was pushing.
He didn’t want reassurance. He didn’t want sense. He didn’t want fellowship. He did not want a substantive conversation. I found it mind-bending, to be faced down by this wilful ignorance from one of the cleverest people I knew. I felt like a prey object. Putnam was forty-nine! And as well as living , had he not spent a good proportion of those years reading, thinking, watching films? Had none of that given him an inkling of how to face life? Some model for elegant survival? Maybe this was all one in the eye for that old myth. Or new myth, was it? Newspaper-pedalled? If I thought of it that way I was less lost.
In section 2 we suddenly dart back in time to when the narrator is a young girl. We see holidays to Majorca and Corfu. We see a house shared with mother and grandmother in which the three individuals didn’t really talk, there were merely shouted instructions up and down the stairs. The level of observation within these pages is exquisite. The refusal to try a little of someone else’s meal, the insistence, the refusal, back and forth. Wonderfully observed.
Later in the book, Laura’s mother acquires a boyfriend. This leads us down the path to a good deal of humour. The man’s names was David.
When David featured in her conversation it was only ever in this role: as am inexplicable encumbrance, a kind of mortifying, supernatural blight. It struck me later that it was only me who called David her boyfriend. All she ever said, in all those years, was that they ‘went around together’. His motives were mysterious, too. It seemed an outlandish fate, to trail along behind my mother, ignored and despised.
And about a page later:
She didn’t miss a beat, when David left her. She continued to lambast him, but from a new angle. In line with her ‘going around together’ she now said he’d ‘gone off with’ an old girlfriend – somebody from decades ago who had found him on Facebook. Just weeks later he was moving in with her, into her cottage in Yorkshire.
I love the humour of it, the reality not far removed from events in my own life, echoes of things that people would say. A very enjoyable read.
May 20, 2026
Anyone looking to know more about Gwendoline Riley will inevitably be greeted with her death stare. For me, this is like a hand held out in welcome.
Riley is another one of the Female Discontents, a cadre of contemporary writers that haven’t gotten enough attention for being what they are—snarky, ironic, pissed off. Mightn’t we get a nihilist sometime soon?
Others of this dark brigade include Ottessa Moshfegh, Mary South, Claire Vaye Watkins. Moshfegh showed some syntactical promise with My Year of Rest and Relaxation, but ultimately (and she’ll tell you this in interviews) it is her career that is ironic, which she doesn’t care about, not her characters or her writing. Mary South had the voice of doom in her prose but apparently she got hitched and has yet to release anything since her FSG double from 2020. (What would Chigurh say to her “marrying into it”? I can hear Philip Roth, the male version of this type of writer, scoffing in his grave.) And Claire Vaye, oh Claire Vaye… like her Farsi/Croat compatriot, she’s been given the keys to literary fame (or at least a literary career, which today is like winning a fucking sweepstakes) and responded with “I never really done-did like books much.”
Which brings us back to Riley. What’s her take? From her interviews (she hates the word “imagination”, and confidently believes there is “no future for literary fiction”) you might think that she too has given up on the one thing she set about doing with her life. But the book itself—her true voice—says something different.
Deceptively minimal, elliptical to the core, and observant in the style of Jane Austen (the Anti-version of this kind of writer), Riley still believes in that tiny corner of her soul from which her writing springs. She knows that this is all one really has. That belief shines out of the pages as it does from her eyes.
People en masse seem unable to comprehend the optimism of such a sad, unfulfilled, offended POV. Critics can only see the “dark subject matter” and the “horribly vivid” descriptions, but fail to see that this is someone who has experienced them, lived to tell about them, who has incorporated them into their creativity as a means of overcoming them. She isn’t advocating for them, ffs. When she describes a sexual assault at the hands of one of the few people on earth she believed in, she isn’t saying “Hey! This would be a great idea for a book cover!”
One has to wonder though, if there is some fault in the person who cannot escape from these kinds of interactions. If everyone you encounter is so god-damned passive aggressive, such a shitty person, so self-sabotaging, are those qualities not in you too? Do they attract each other? Laura seems constantly to seek the opposite, is that some kind of existential naivete? Is it forgivable?
Harder questions to answer. But for one willing to see through the eyes of her death stare, there will always be the possibility of seeing a smile in the mirror’s reflection.
Riley is another one of the Female Discontents, a cadre of contemporary writers that haven’t gotten enough attention for being what they are—snarky, ironic, pissed off. Mightn’t we get a nihilist sometime soon?
Others of this dark brigade include Ottessa Moshfegh, Mary South, Claire Vaye Watkins. Moshfegh showed some syntactical promise with My Year of Rest and Relaxation, but ultimately (and she’ll tell you this in interviews) it is her career that is ironic, which she doesn’t care about, not her characters or her writing. Mary South had the voice of doom in her prose but apparently she got hitched and has yet to release anything since her FSG double from 2020. (What would Chigurh say to her “marrying into it”? I can hear Philip Roth, the male version of this type of writer, scoffing in his grave.) And Claire Vaye, oh Claire Vaye… like her Farsi/Croat compatriot, she’s been given the keys to literary fame (or at least a literary career, which today is like winning a fucking sweepstakes) and responded with “I never really done-did like books much.”
Which brings us back to Riley. What’s her take? From her interviews (she hates the word “imagination”, and confidently believes there is “no future for literary fiction”) you might think that she too has given up on the one thing she set about doing with her life. But the book itself—her true voice—says something different.
Deceptively minimal, elliptical to the core, and observant in the style of Jane Austen (the Anti-version of this kind of writer), Riley still believes in that tiny corner of her soul from which her writing springs. She knows that this is all one really has. That belief shines out of the pages as it does from her eyes.
People en masse seem unable to comprehend the optimism of such a sad, unfulfilled, offended POV. Critics can only see the “dark subject matter” and the “horribly vivid” descriptions, but fail to see that this is someone who has experienced them, lived to tell about them, who has incorporated them into their creativity as a means of overcoming them. She isn’t advocating for them, ffs. When she describes a sexual assault at the hands of one of the few people on earth she believed in, she isn’t saying “Hey! This would be a great idea for a book cover!”
One has to wonder though, if there is some fault in the person who cannot escape from these kinds of interactions. If everyone you encounter is so god-damned passive aggressive, such a shitty person, so self-sabotaging, are those qualities not in you too? Do they attract each other? Laura seems constantly to seek the opposite, is that some kind of existential naivete? Is it forgivable?
Harder questions to answer. But for one willing to see through the eyes of her death stare, there will always be the possibility of seeing a smile in the mirror’s reflection.
May 26, 2026
DNF @70%. From the opening dialogue between two friends in a pub I was uncertain what world I was in and who these people were to each other. It seemed an odd way to open a novel.
And then a series of vignettes unfolded, revealing more about the protagonist, but seemingly random snapshots of her upbringing, albeit some key.
The continuity was tenuous but I plowed on. Isn’t there a point though when we need a story arc and a purpose to the story? Isn’t good writing about the construct as well as the telling?
Her friend losing his job, and floundering, was a side hustle. And even the writing was ho hum. Note to self: when Sarah J Parker gushes about a book, beware.
And then a series of vignettes unfolded, revealing more about the protagonist, but seemingly random snapshots of her upbringing, albeit some key.
The continuity was tenuous but I plowed on. Isn’t there a point though when we need a story arc and a purpose to the story? Isn’t good writing about the construct as well as the telling?
Her friend losing his job, and floundering, was a side hustle. And even the writing was ho hum. Note to self: when Sarah J Parker gushes about a book, beware.
May 13, 2026
Very reminiscent of Barbara Pym to me in its quiet humor, subtle commentary on aging, innate Britishness, and peripheral and primarily platonic relationships.
One thing I notice about Riley's novels is her specific talent towards writing such real feeling characters, so real at times they contribute heavily to their own unlikability.
I would still claim My Phantoms as her best work, but I did enjoy this one more than First Love, her other most known novel. It ultimately works decently well as
an equally quirky and solemn slice of life novel that
comments on the common introspective struggles of life.
One thing I notice about Riley's novels is her specific talent towards writing such real feeling characters, so real at times they contribute heavily to their own unlikability.
I would still claim My Phantoms as her best work, but I did enjoy this one more than First Love, her other most known novel. It ultimately works decently well as
an equally quirky and solemn slice of life novel that
comments on the common introspective struggles of life.
May 18, 2026
I purchased this book because Sarah Jessica Parker was raving about it on Instagram. What a huge disappointment. It was disjointed — a series of vignettes of self-absorbed individuals without a moral compass. The reader is a fly on the wall who happens to land in different scenarios. There is a triggering scene where she is sexually assaulted, as a minor, by a comedian (Russell Brand-ish). The description of the ensuing yeast infection was enough to make me want to put the book down permanently. I would not recommend this book to anyone.
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