The Bolter: The Story of Idina Sackville, Who Ran Away to Become the Chief Seductress of Kenya's Scandalous "Happy Valley Set"

"You don't want to be known as `the Bolter's granddaughter'," warned Frances Osborne's mother. Osborne was the Bolter's great-granddaughter, and the mother was worried about how people might have spoken about herself. The thirteen-year-old Osborne had come across a photograph of the ravishing Lady Idina Sackville, and wanted to know more, for the existence of the scandalous Idina was a dark family secret. "My mother was right to be cautious: Idina and her blackened reputation glistened before me. In an age of wicked women she had pushed the boundaries of behavior to extremes." And thus Osborne was set on years of research, looking into family troves of diaries and letters, as well as society newspaper stories, and conducting interviews of those who knew Idina. Now in _The Bolter_ (Knopf), she has given a biography of the highly-spirited, sad woman whom she never knew. It is sort of a family biographical exorcism, but the book stands well on its own, as a portrait of Idina as well as of the heady times which were her heyday. There is mischievous fun here, and great sadness as well, and the charming and flawed Idina could not have gotten a more sympathetic evaluation. In 1913, Idina made what has to be considered a conventional marriage to Euan Wallace, a cavalry officer and a millionaire heir. They were blissfully rich, and at least initially were blissful in other ways. "Idina completed her introduction to sex: an activity for which she discovered she had a talent, but which she clearly found so intensely enjoyable that it rapidly became impossible for her to resist any opportunity for it." She was quickly pregnant, and bore Wallace two sons. The couple were busy with a social life in London, and building a mansion in Ayrshire. Then came World War I, and Wallace fought right through it. He did come home on leave, and the reunions were good, except that Idina was ill and could not keep up with Euan's socializing. He fell for another woman, and she determined she would not stand for that sort of abandonment without taking her own lovers. When she fell for Charles Gordon, Euan confronted her, insisting that she had to give up the affair or to divorce. She bolted with Gordon, and in so doing, abandoned her young sons, with whom she would have no contact until they were adults. Gordon was her introduction to British East Africa, later Kenya, where she would live on and off for the rest of her life. Her third marriage was to a sexual equal, Josslyn Hay, Earl of Erroll, who was eight years her junior. Both of them enjoyed having a variety of sexual partners and needed the variety. People who came to parties at their plantation could not just come for an evening; it was a trek to get there, so the gatherings went on for days. Guests could expect to find pajamas and a bottle of whiskey ready on their pillows on arrival. Joss, a teetotaler, filled everyone else's glass and Idina served as the mistress of ceremonies which included

In writing The Bolter Frances Osborne confronted and dealt with some fascinating albeit unsavory details from her family background. Her great grandmother was Lady Idina Sackville, known as The Bolter in London high society in the 1920s and 1930s due to her string of love affairs, flirtations, and five husbands. Osborne has done a fine job of tracing and telling the story of her ancestress in the context of her times. Lady Idina Sackville was born into an unconventional family. Her parents separated shortly after her birth, and Idina and her sister and brother lived a life of material plenty but emotional shortages. Idina married for the first time at 20, divorced for the first time at 25, and then embarked on a string of love affairs and marriages, none of which lasted for more than a few years. Despite having less money than most aristocrats, she managed to live in luxury in Britain and in Kenya and maintained a reputation for well dressed elegance and panache. Osborne does a good job explaining the ins and outs of her great-grandmother's life, using diaries and letters as well as newspaper accounts of her doings. She never really gives as good a sense of what the five husbands were like, with the possible exceptions of the first and third, except for the general observation that all of them were just as emotionally needy and rambunctious as Idina herself. There's also quite a bit of interesting information about Kenya in its days as a British colony, when it served as a rendezvous or hide out for aristocrats who wished to lead a more colorful life than was possible back home. Lady Idina and most of her husbands, friends, and lovers were intelligent people who ought to have led fuller, more praiseworthy lives. Their story is both interesting and cautionary.

Book review: The Bolter by Frances Osborne [...] The author's intelligent Youtube promo parallels the span of this fascinating book: modern sensibilities stretching the boundries of old guard traditional values, encompassing all with as much reason as abandon. The book well answers our appalled collective gasp of- how could these real life characters act so? Those of us who were adolescents or young adults in the 1960's will have no recourse but to identify with the decadent counter-culture within the times profiled in this book. Also, I myself have been to Kenya and understand firsthand its incredible sway. For the rest, all material whether emotional or historical, no matter how exuberant or painful for subject or reader, is well explained within its context, in Osborne's eminently readable prose. Thus the book is best for two types of readers: completists of the Happy Valley, Kenya goings on via James Fox' "White Mischief" or Errol Trzebinski's parallel tome, and everyone else in the world with an interest in social history of the first half of the 20th century via well-heeled (and occasionally just heels) Brits and Brit expats.

A most entertaining book, extremely well written and researched. The Bolter is the author's great grandmother, although she of course never met her and was only told about her when she was in her early teens. However she become fascinated with Dina's story and somehow has managed to find almost all the details of her life and some very good pictures, which she has made into this fascinating book. Dina was married five times and had three children. She came to live in Kenya after divorcing her first husband, and then spent most of the rest of her life there, living a very `racy' lifestyle, and entertaining her many friends to drink and drug fuelled weekends. She became known as the leader of the `Happy Valley' set, which was the valley where her farm was, in a mountainous area far from Nairobi. As her story unfolds, one gets more and more sympathetic to Dina and her unusual lifestyle. She became very depressed as she approached middle-age with no close family ties, although she did start to get to know one of her sons just before he was killed and renewed her friendship with her married daughter. The final blow for her, which she never recovered from, was when her first husband and both her sons died within a short time of each other. She herself died about ten years later. A riveting unputdownable book, especially if you know the country and the people there that are mentioned, as I do.

Everything about this book is intrguing, from its topic and story to the relationship of the author to the woman that the book is about. In The Bolter, author Frances Osborne tells the story of her great-grandmother, Lady Idina Sackville, a women who married privledge only to feel stiffled by it. Feeling trapped, she bolts (hence the title) the marriage and divorces her husband, agrees never to see her young sons again, and goes to Africa to live a Bohemian life style, ripe with intrigue, freewheeling sex and other adventures that a lady of good breeding may dream about, but would never entertain if she valued her family. But thats what makes this such a juicy ride. Osborne's great grandmother is driven to lead a reckless wild life with few regrets. While she does eventually meet her young adult sons, the meeting is just that, not a reunion, but a bit of a reality check; it reminded me of one of those forced meetings between a child and one of their parents friends - forced pleasantries and uncomfortable interests, but its brilliantly written. Of course one of the greatest ironies is that Osbourne is married to a Torrey Member of Parliament, and she's written a very torrid account of Sackville. So this reviewer HIGHLY recommends this book