Loitering with intent

Art, reality and the strange ways the two imitate one another are at the core of Muriel Spark's delightful Loitering with Intent, first published in 1981. Would-be novelist Fleur Talbot works for the snooty, irascible Sir Quentin Oliver at the Autobiographical Association, whose members are all at work on their memoirs. When her employer gets his hands on Fleur's novel-in-progress, mayhem ensues when its scenes begin coming true. Generating hilarious turns of phrase and larger-than-life characters (especially Sir Quentin's batty mother), Sparks's inimitable style make this literary joyride thoroughly appealing. ( June 28) (c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved

Though first published only 20 years ago, Spark's offbeat fiction certainly deserves a place in the publisher's line of contemporary classics. Kirkus (March 15, 1981, p. 384) noticed that Spark was turning "her raised-eyebrow stare in on herself," or at least on a writer much like herself. When her aspiring-writer protagonist starts pilfering from the stodgy memoirs she's ghosting for some dull aristos , all sorts of complications ensue. Spark confronts the big questions of art: "Life vs. Fiction, Invention vs. Truth, Creativity vs. Paranoia." Kirkus identified those "moments that are pure, tart Spark," and compared the novel to the work of Thomas Berger and Italo Calvino. In this "grand, elusive little entertainment," we spotted "eccentric comedy on the surface and serious literary matters scurrying around below."