3.5 stars. The Debut is certainly well-written, but a hard book to read. It is a pretty depressing story of Ruth Weiss, a Balzac scholar and teacher. The story begins with Ruth, at 40, then goes back through her sad life, with odd, self-centered parents, a distant grandmother, a neglectful housekeeper, critical friends, and unrequited love. Much of Ruth's childhood is shocking by today's standards. The Debut, an unseemly title, is Brookner's first novel, first published in 1981.

"So eager was she to join this upward movement toward the light that she hardly noticed that her home resembled the ones she was reading about: a superficial veil of amusement over a deep well of disappointment." (11)

". . . George knew that he no longer loved his wife. He felt - and this he had always felt, although he did not know the reason - extremely sorry for her. As a natural corollary, he felt extremely sorry for himself." (91)

"He had thought he was keeping up quite well with changing times, but suddenly they seemed to have changed against his will." (137)

"In the country of the old and sick there are environmental hazards. Cautious days. Early nights. A silent, aging life in which the anxiety of the invalid overrides the vitality of the untouched." (185)