Packing Up: Further Adventures of a Trailing Spouse

(Paperback)

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_____________________ The fabulous follow-up memoir to the word-of-mouth sensation Diplomatic Baggage _____________________ 'Hilarious and hair-raising by turns' - Daily Mail 'Refreshingly candid. Wherever in the world she is writing from, her warmth and her sharp observations wont fail to delight' - Orlando Bird, Financial Times 'Such a pleasure to read' - Sainsburys Magazine _____________________ Brigid Keenan was a successful young London fashion journalist when she fell in love with a diplomat and left behind the gilt chairs of the Paris salons for a large chicken shed in Nepal. Her bestselling account of life as a trailing spouse, Diplomatic Baggage, won the hearts of thousands in countries all over the world. Now, in her further adventures, we find Brigid in Kazakhstan, where AW, her husband, contracts Lyme disease from a tick, the local delicacy is horse meat sausage and Brigids visit to a market leads to a full-scale riot from which she requires a police escort. Then, as the prospect retirement looms, Brigid finds herself on the cusp of a whole new world: shuttling between London, Brussels and their last posting in Azerbaijan, navigating her daughters weddings while coping with a cancer diagnosis, and getting a crash course in grand-motherhood as she helps organise a literature festival in Palestine. Along the way, dauntless and wildly funny as ever, Brigid learns that packing up doesnt mean packing in as she discovers that retiring and moving back home could just be her biggest challenge yet. _____________________ 'With flashes of Nancy Mitford wit ... Brigid Keenan is as skittish as a kitten with needle claws, as stricken as a deer in headlights, and as smart as a cage of monkeys. Brava!' - The Times

Reviews

So funny and frank and moving * Deborah Moggach *
Hilarious and hair-raising by turns * Daily Mail *
Such a pleasure to read * Sainsburys Magazine *
With flashes of Nancy Mitford wit about embassy life, as a Facebook neophyte and surviving cancer, Brigid Keenan is as skittish as a kitten with needle claws, as stricken as a deer in headlights, and as smart as a cage of monkeys. Brava! * The Times *
Brigid Keenan is the reincarnation of Norman Wisdom, Inspector Clouseau and Frank Spencer rolled into one. Everything she touches turns into farce ... Heres an idea, which, in exchange for an Executive Producers credit, I shall divulge that, without delay, lovably eccentric Brigid gets to be portrayed by Emma Thompson in a classic TV sitcom -- Roger Lewis * Daily Mail *
[A]vibrant sequel to Diplomatic Baggage ... something interesting on every page -- Philippa Williams * The Lady *
Keenan has an eye for farce, documenting missed flights, lost luggage and misunderstandings ... She is refreshingly candid. Wherever in the world she is writing from, her warmth and her sharp observations wont fail to delight -- Orlando Bird * Financial Times *

Author Bio

Brigid Keenan is an author and journalist. She has worked as an editor on Nova magazine, the Observer and the Sunday Times. She has published two fashion histories as well as Travels in Kashmir, Damascus and the best selling Diplomatic Baggage and is a founding board member of the Palestine Festival of Literature. She lives in Pimlico and Somerset.