I’m not a great one for reading prize winning books or books that have created a big hoo-ha, call me thrawn (stubborn) but I don’t ever like to be going with the prevailing fashion. So I’ve been some time getting around to reading Simon Mawer’s The Glass Room which was shortlisted for the Man Booker Prize in 2009. I know I read about it on someone’s blog recently, but I can’t remember whose. I read it in a few days and when I got to the end of it I thought to myself – who on earth DID win the prize that year then? I guessed maybe it was Wolf Hall and it turned out I was right. What bad luck for Mawer that his book was up against Wolf Hall. The blurb on the front says: ‘A novel of extraordinary beauty’ Guardian – and it is.

It is set in Czechoslovakia with the story beginning in 1928 when Viktor and Liesel Landauer have just got married. Viktor is a wealthy Jew, the family business is the production of luxury cars. On their honeymoon they meet a young architect who persuades them to allow him to design their new home. The Glass Room as the house is called is a modernist and minimalist series of boxes, all very sleek and expensive with huge plate glass windows, one of which lowers electronically like a car window ( I want it).

After almost ten years of marriage which include the birth of their son and daughter, the Landauers’ seemingly idyllic existence is shattered when the Nazis invade Czechoslovakia. As Viktor is a Jew they know that their time there is coming to an end.

That’s as much as I’m willing to say about the story as I don’t want to ruin it for anyone who like me is late in getting to this book.

I do love books that have a house at the heart of them though, like the house is as much a character as any of the humans. The house at the centre of this one does actually exist as The Glass Room was based on the Villa Tugendhadt in Brno, Czech Republic. You can see images of the house here.

This is the first book by Simon Mawer that I’ve read but I’m keen to read more. Have any of you read anything else by him? if so could you point me in the direction of my next Mawer read?