Cassandra at the Wedding

'I am not, at heart, a jumper. I think I knew all the time I was sizing up the bridge that the strong possibility was I'd attend my sister's wedding' Cassandra Edwards is driving home to her family's Californian ranch to attend the wedding of her beloved identical twin, Judith. A graduate student at Berkeley, Cassandra is gay, brilliant, nerve-racked, miserable - and hell-bent on making sure her sister's wedding doesn't happen. Armed with a clutch bag full of pills and an unquenchable thirst for brandy, Cassandra arrives determined to make Judith see sense. But over the course of the next couple of days, Cassandra unravels. A classic of twentieth-century American literature, Cassandra at the Wedding is a stylish, witty and insightful novel about love, loyalty and coming to terms with the only life you have. 'Modern readers will relish the pin-sharp portrait of a tiny part of society, as if picked out in Californian sunlight. Really good writing like this doesn't age.' Guardian 'The mastery of technique here is just about absolute.' New York Times 'So brilliant, completely mad. It s about female rivalry, being left behind... It really made me laugh. A great examination of a female friendship.'Dolly Alderton Witty and assured. Her tone is dark but jaunty, the writing off-handedly smart.' London Review of Books 'Baker's touching, witty and sharp character study is an overlooked twentieth century American literary classic, featuring a protagonist easily as headstrong, vulnerable and compelling as Holden Caulfield.' BBC Radio 4 '[Baker's] ear for dialogue is acute, her prose immaculate... this is a novel of exceptional quality.' TLS