Helen Bain - The Daffodil Days

About

The Bookery is delighted to welcome novelist Helen Bain for a compelling evening in conversation at 7pm on Thursday 26 March, as she discusses her extraordinary debut novel The Daffodil Days .
Set in Creditons neighbouring North Tawton in 1962, The Daffodil Days is a richly atmospheric portrait of Devon village life woven around incoming literary couple Slyvia Plath and Ted Hughes. It will feel both familiar and quietly revelatory to local readers.

Told through a multiperspective narrative, the novel paints a vivid picture of the community and its inner worlds: the village doctor, the bell ringers, the shop assistants, and others whose daily lives unfold beneath the steady rhythm of rural seasonal routines. Through their shifting viewpoints, one of the twentieth centurys most iconic literary figures, Sylvia Plath, comes into kaleidoscopic focus.
The young couple arrive in the thatched house beside the church at Court Green with their small daughter, and their presence sends ripples through the town. Hopes, tensions, and quiet observations accumulate, revealing both the intimacy of village life and the private emotional landscapes behind it. For Crediton audiences, the novel offers not only a captivating story, but a fascinating glimpse into early1960s Devonits textures, its silences, and the lives lived just a generation ago.

Helen Bainspent much time in North Tawton, interviewing villagers as part of her research as well as learning bee keeping, bellringing and horse riding, thoroughly immersing herself in village life as well as the literary output of Plath and Hughes.
Critics have praised the novel for its emotional precision and vivid sense of place:
The Daffodil Days brings the characters in a rural community to life in a way that evokes Andrew Milers A Land in Winter, while shedding a fresh light on the last year of Sylvia Plaths extraordinary life. A compassionate, perceptive and truly wonderful book Miranda Seymour

Helen Bain works as a subeditor at the Financial Times and has previously worked at the Guardian, Vogue and Red. She holds two MA degrees from Birkbeck University and has been selected for The London Library Emerging Writers Programme and The Genesis Foundation Emerging Writers Programme.

This event forms part of The Bookerys vibrant programme of author talks and cultural events and proudly contributes to our celebrations for the National Year of Reading, championing books, stories and the joy of reading across our community.
Helen will be answering questions and signing copies of The Daffodil Days after the event.