Evening Standard review

. . .The Clothes On Their Backs is a return to the form of Linda Grant's first and best novel, The Cast iron Shore. Gripping and written with keen understatement it managed to be a domestic coming of age story, even as it takes in, via Sandor, the tumultuous sweep of the 20th century (in Sandor's run-down boarding house, Vivien doesn't only find her roots, her great grandfather "with the curls in front of his ears', but animal sex, too.)

In other words, that rare thing, a novel of big ideas that never forgets to tell you a story. Any frocks and bolero jackets you happen to come upon along the way are just the icing on the cake.

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