The Bottle Factory Outing: A Novel
Beryl Bainbridge
Oct 2016 · Open Road Media
Ebook
200
Pages
About this ebook
Named by the Observer as “one of the 100 greatest novels of all time,” this dark comedy with a disturbing twist follows two working-class women in 1970s London.
Unlikely friends Brenda and Freda share a rundown room in London and toil away at an Italian factory pasting labels onto wine bottles. Brenda, a shy and passive thirty-three-year-old brunette, recently ran away to the city to escape an abusive husband. Freda, meanwhile, is a rebellious twenty-six-year-old blonde with big dreams and a penchant for bossing people around.
The two women are the only English workers at the bottling facility, and their presence certainly stirs up trouble. Freda has a crush on the trainee manager, Vittorio, and tries to get close to him despite the fact that he’s engaged to an Italian girl. Brenda, on the other hand, spends a fair amount of time trying to distance herself from the advances of the factory’s manager, Mr. Rossi.
When Freda organizes a company outing, what’s supposed to be a day of freedom and fun turns into a dark and chaotic tragedy. The workers plan to travel by van to a stately castle, where they will picnic and drink wine before visiting an African safari. But the van never shows up, and when they finally do make it to the castle, something goes fatally wrong.
Shortlisted for the Man Booker Prize, The Bottle Factory Outing was inspired by author Beryl Bainbridge’s own experiences working as a cellar girl in the mid-twentieth century. Intertwining themes of loneliness and friendship, sexual frustration and personal power, passion and murder, this tragicomedy is a British classic that depicts working-class life as something both terribly morose and wickedly funny.
This ebook features an illustrated biography of Beryl Bainbridge including rare images from the author’s estate.
Unlikely friends Brenda and Freda share a rundown room in London and toil away at an Italian factory pasting labels onto wine bottles. Brenda, a shy and passive thirty-three-year-old brunette, recently ran away to the city to escape an abusive husband. Freda, meanwhile, is a rebellious twenty-six-year-old blonde with big dreams and a penchant for bossing people around.
The two women are the only English workers at the bottling facility, and their presence certainly stirs up trouble. Freda has a crush on the trainee manager, Vittorio, and tries to get close to him despite the fact that he’s engaged to an Italian girl. Brenda, on the other hand, spends a fair amount of time trying to distance herself from the advances of the factory’s manager, Mr. Rossi.
When Freda organizes a company outing, what’s supposed to be a day of freedom and fun turns into a dark and chaotic tragedy. The workers plan to travel by van to a stately castle, where they will picnic and drink wine before visiting an African safari. But the van never shows up, and when they finally do make it to the castle, something goes fatally wrong.
Shortlisted for the Man Booker Prize, The Bottle Factory Outing was inspired by author Beryl Bainbridge’s own experiences working as a cellar girl in the mid-twentieth century. Intertwining themes of loneliness and friendship, sexual frustration and personal power, passion and murder, this tragicomedy is a British classic that depicts working-class life as something both terribly morose and wickedly funny.
This ebook features an illustrated biography of Beryl Bainbridge including rare images from the author’s estate.
About the author
Dame Beryl Bainbridge (1932–2010) is acknowledged as one of the greatest British novelists of her time. She was the author of two travel books, five plays, and seventeen novels, five of which were shortlisted for the Man Booker Prize, including Master Georgie, which went on to win the James Tait Black Memorial Prize and the WHSmith Literary Award. She was also awarded the Whitbread Literary Award twice, for Injury Time and Every Man for Himself. In 2011, a special Man Booker “Best of Beryl” Prize was awarded in her honor, voted for by members of the public.
Born in Liverpool and raised in nearby Formby, Bainbridge spent her early years working as an actress, leaving the theater to have her first child. Her first novel, Harriet Said . . ., was written around this time, although it was rejected by several publishers who found it “indecent.” Her first published works were Another Part of the Wood and An Awfully Big Adventure, and many of her early novels retell her Liverpudlian childhood. A number of her books have been adapted for the screen, most notably An Awfully Big Adventure, which is set in provincial theater and was made into a film by Mike Newell, starring Alan Rickman and Hugh Grant. She later turned to more historical themes, such as the Scott Expedition in The Birthday Boys, a retelling of the Titanic story in Every Man for Himself, and Master Georgie, which follows Liverpudlians during the Crimean War. Her no-word-wasted style and tight plotting have won her critical acclaim and a committed following. Bainbridge regularly contributed articles and reviews to the Guardian, Observer, and Spectator, among others, and she was the Oldie’s longstanding theater critic. In 2008, she appeared at number twenty-six in a list of the fifty most important novelists since 1945 compiled by the Times (London). At the time of her death, Bainbridge was working on a new novel, The Girl in the Polka Dot Dress, which was published posthumously.
Born in Liverpool and raised in nearby Formby, Bainbridge spent her early years working as an actress, leaving the theater to have her first child. Her first novel, Harriet Said . . ., was written around this time, although it was rejected by several publishers who found it “indecent.” Her first published works were Another Part of the Wood and An Awfully Big Adventure, and many of her early novels retell her Liverpudlian childhood. A number of her books have been adapted for the screen, most notably An Awfully Big Adventure, which is set in provincial theater and was made into a film by Mike Newell, starring Alan Rickman and Hugh Grant. She later turned to more historical themes, such as the Scott Expedition in The Birthday Boys, a retelling of the Titanic story in Every Man for Himself, and Master Georgie, which follows Liverpudlians during the Crimean War. Her no-word-wasted style and tight plotting have won her critical acclaim and a committed following. Bainbridge regularly contributed articles and reviews to the Guardian, Observer, and Spectator, among others, and she was the Oldie’s longstanding theater critic. In 2008, she appeared at number twenty-six in a list of the fifty most important novelists since 1945 compiled by the Times (London). At the time of her death, Bainbridge was working on a new novel, The Girl in the Polka Dot Dress, which was published posthumously.
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