A MIRROR FOR SKYLARKS

Enchanted Winter was my first love, so it is hard for Martin Hare to measure up to that -- but I do think this the best thing she has done, next to that delicious book. The story of a French widow, impecunious, impractical and altogether charming, and of her attempts to run a pension in Paris, where she carries most of her boarders on hopes and promises. A heterogeneous collection they are:- a drug addict and the possessive female who supplies her; the lascivious old wastrel; the old woman with the gigolo; the silent Turk; the idealistic young English lad; the slovenly maid of all work; the daughter fresh from the convent and determined to reform her mother. There is more atmosphere build-up than plot, perhaps -- but it is first rate ""building.