Where to start with Muriel Spark

British novelist, 1918–2006.

Best Muriel Spark book to start with: The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie (1961), on 8 of the 17 lists it could have made.

The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie is the obvious first Spark. It is short and funny, set in an Edinburgh girls’ school in the 1930s, where a charismatic teacher picks a few favourites and tries to shape them. The narrative often jumps ahead in time, which is part of its charm. You can read it in an afternoon.

All her books are brief, so it is easy to try several. The Girls of Slender Means is set in a hostel for young women in London at the end of the war. The Driver’s Seat, shortlisted for the Booker Prize in 1970, is a short and chilling story of a woman on a journey, and it is the one to choose for something darker. The Public Image, shortlisted in 1969, follows an actress, and Loitering with Intent, shortlisted in 1981, follows a young writer. Both are comic and sharp, and both are best read once you have enjoyed two others.