The Muse

- Blurb -

The Muse is the story of a female friendship. It starts with Nell's account of a chance meeting with Josie at the age of 18.Josie showed her how to live for the moment, encouraging her to climb on the back of the motorbike of a boy she didn't know, pursuing adventures, finding the sweetness of life sometimes in very hard circumstances.Through Josie Nell also met Olive, a beautiful prostitute who worked in Soho in a grand style, employing her own maid and dresser. Olive was not a victim but living the way she wanted to live. One of Nell's joyful memories of lying on Olive's bed in Broad Street while she showered her with pound notes. This was the Sixties, a time of literary and sexual experimentation, of the breakdown of old barriers and inhibitions. The Muse follows the friendship of between these women over the decades. Josie always carried herself like a star, and as the inspiration for Nell's novels of working-class women Poor Cow and Up the Junction and the play Steaming - all of which were made into movies - she eventually became one, portrayed on the big screen and feted by producers on Broadway.Josie hooked up with a series of increasingly dodgy men, including a unsuccessful criminal who got into trouble with the law while trying to steal in order to supply Josie with the good and shiny things she so loved. Later there was a sugar daddy who turned out to be not very well off.Life is the thing, was Josie's philosophy. But where would this philosophy of taking no care for tomorrow lead her?In prose of unique clarity and simplicity Nell gets straight to the heart of matter and meditates on how female friendship has inspired her and given her the best life has to offer.