Notes on a Scandal
Book Title: Notes on a Scandal Author: Zoe Heller Publisher: Penguin ISBN: 978-0-141-03995-4 No. of Pages: 245 “You never appreciate what a compost your memory is until you start trying to smooth past events into a rational sequence.”(Barbara Covett) This is a fictional memoir of a history teacher at St. George named Barbara Covett; it is a memoir which is also psychological thriller. Barabara Covett is the close confidante of Sheba Hart aka ‘Queen of Sheba’ who seemed to her like “some magical lake in a fairytale: nothing could disturb the mirror-calm of her surface”. However, the memoir unfolds her tragedy and by the end, she is left drooping and howling. Queen of Sheba is found guilty of having an affair with one of her pupils, Steven Connolly! Zoe Heller has written the book in the first-person point of view. The language is colloquial and makes it a brilliant prose to read: it is straightforward; tinted with interesting wisecracks such as “you know how you som