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It would have been easy for the monologues to be formulaic, but this hasn't happened. Each one has freshness, as though the idea had never been used before. It must have taken a great deal of effort - and talent - to get completely inside the skin of a character and develop it so fully in the space of about 15 pages. The writing is elegant and the ear for dialogue has been finely tuned. It's a joy to read.
The monologue in this form - speaking directly to the listener or the reader - is not as old as might be thought. Most monologues in earlier literature were directed at another character and, surprisingly enough, the earliest exponent of this form seems to be Alan Bennett with his [[''Talking Heads]]''. If I had one difficulty in reading ''A Certain Age'' it was that I kept thinking of Alan Bennett and making slightly unfair comparisons. These monologues are not quite as good, but then Bennett is the master of such writing and he makes it look effortless. Lynne Truss is very good, but if I had to try and put my finger on the difference I'd say that she lacks Bennett's edge of acidity, that feeling that he could be unpleasant but would prefer not to be.
I don't like short stories - I tend to think of them as ideas which never quite made it to book-length form - and I've lost count of the number of times that I've read one story and never bothered with the rest. It's a tribute to the strength and quality of this book that after I'd read one story I was keen to get on to the next. Each monologue held me completely and tempted me to read more.
