Hearts and Minds

I finished reading Rosy Thornton's 'Hearts and Minds' last night, and thoroughly enjoyed it. Not at all like her first book, but as I am always keen on novels set in universities I was quite happy to read this one. James Rycarte has been appointed Mistress - or should that be Master? - of St Radegund's College, Cambridge. He is a man in a woman's world as it is an all female college.
The college is faced with a serious moral dilemma. It needs a large amount of money to restore the college library which is slowly sinking into the Fens.

Along comes an Italian benefactor willing to offer the money in exchange for his daughter's entry to the college. In addition to potentially compromising its admissions policy the college has to decide whether the money has been honestly come by - especially when the potential donor is arrested in Italy for corruption.

James is faced with trying to do the best for the college without making to many enemies in the process. He establishes a rapport with the senior tutor, who's marriage is falling about her ears, and whose days at the college are numbered. Sometimes Martha seems to be his only friend at the college. Will James survive his baptism of fire and manage to keep his job?

The moral dilemmas involved take this book above the common run and turn it into a thoughtful and humorous story which pokes gentle fun at some of the characters who can be found at any Oxbridge college.

I'm now reading Alison Penton Harper's 'Housewife on Top', successor to 'Housewife Down and 'Housewife Up'