WE HAD IT SO GOOD by Linda Grant (fiction)

I picked up Linda Grant's novel because the setting was Oxford and London in the late 1960s right up to the present time.  I was living in London during the same period of time and the main characters are my age.  I was not disappointed!  It was a delight to revisit those carefree idealistic, yet troubled times and measure my experiences against the characters of the novel.  The novel follows an American at Oxford who becomes entangled with a group of louche Brits and follows their lives, loves, friends, children, struggles and successes to our present time.  Grant's characters are realistic and the reader really cares about them.  Bill Clinton even makes an appearance as a Rhodes scholar at Oxford. Grant begins her chapters with the musings of the different characters and sometimes it takes a few paragraphs to determine who is talking to the reader.  I enjoyed the book immensely and highly recommend it.