Great Granny Webster

CAROLINE BLACKWOODS MASTERPIECE, SHORTLISTED FOR THE 1977 BOOKER PRIZE

*A New Yorker summer reading pick of 2026*

Full of genuine black humourLONDON REVIEW OF BOOKS
A masterpiece . . . her humour is as wicked as it is mordantJOHN BANVILLE
Caroline Blackwood sits firmly alongside the greats like Shirley Jackson and Patricia HighsmithARAMINTA HALL

In her gloomy mausoleum of a home, the terrifying matriarch Great Granny Webster spends her days sitting bolt upright in a Victorian chair, entirely alone except for her one-eyed maid - and her orphaned great-granddaughter, sent to stay for the sea air. She presides over three generations of ill-fated women, and a twisted family history which spools back through hedonistic 20s London to a crumbling aristocratic pile where two children are kept silently hidden in a distant wing.

This macabre, viciously funny, partly autobiographical novel cuts to the bone of a dysfunctional dynasty, and captures Blackwood at her pitch-black best.

Idiosyncratic, dark and extremely funnyLUCY SCHOLES
A unique literary experiencePHILIP LARKIN
As gripping as a whodunitTLS
Shocking, brilliant, and wickedly funny, Great Granny Webster is Caroline Blackwoods best bookJONATHAN RABAN