by Dee Delaney

Created on: October 18, 2009

'This Time of Dying' is a debut novel from the daughter of the famous comic actor Sid James. The story of the 1918 flu pandemic (commonly referred to as the Spanish Flu) could have been a dry, documentary style read, but Regina James has managed to give the novel a very human feel, combining many years of fastidious research with the ability to create a story of love and compassion that most readers will be able to relate to. Now 60, she began researching 'This Time of Dying' in 2001, taking her inspiration from the deaths of both of her maternal grandparents, who died in the epidemic within a few days of each other in 1918.

The 1918 pandemic is not spoken about much today, even in these times where flu scares are hyped up by the media. It lasted from March 1918 to June 1920, spreading to nearly every part of the world and killing anywhere from 50 to 100 million people worldwide. Unlike many other diseases, this flu ravaged the strong immune systems of young adults, whilst leaving children and the elderly untouched. Regina James writes, not just about the realism of life during a disastrous flu epidemic, but also about the social constraints of the time that very rigidly disapproved of inter-class relationships. Deprivations and losses of war are interwoven into the story, providing a fascinating background without taking over the story. In addition, James describes in enormous detail the day to day life of a 1920s undertaker. This, together with the graphic descriptions of sickness and dying, is not for the fainthearted!

The story only covers a period of three weeks, at the height of the pandemic. Two widowed sisters live together in a rather grim London house; Allen is a teacher who acts as carer and support to her sister Lily, a woman who has become obsessed with her own status as a dependant invalid, pushing Allen to the limits of her endurance. Nearby lives Henry - a quiet bachelor who has devoted his life to carrying on the family business of undertaking, and who is completely dominated by his bossy and prejudiced sisters. Against all odds, Allen and Henry begin a tentative relationship. This relationship is disapproved of by almost everybody, as Henry the tradesman is far beneath the educated Allen in social status.

The background is a sudden rise in the death toll, making Henry's task even more difficult, closing Allen's school, and suddenly tipping the whole of their community into an emergency that nobody could have imagined. Lilly reacts to the

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