1
of
1
Kathleen and Frank
Ratings/reviews counts are updated frequently.
Check link for latest rating. ( 69 ratings, 18 reviews)
Book Hero Magic crafted this summary to help describe this book. While it's new and still
learning, it may not be perfect - your
feedback is welcome!
Summary
Read More
Format: Paperback / softback
$4500
Unit price
/
Unavailable
OVERNIGHT NZ-WIDE DELIVERY
Found a better price? Request a price match
Kathleen and Frank
$4500
Unit price
/
Unavailable
Book Hero Magic created this recommendation. While it's new and still learning, it may not be perfect - your feedback is welcome! IS THIS YOUR NEXT READ?
Ideal for readers interested in biography, social history, and fans of Christopher Isherwood's work seeking a deeper understanding of the man behind the literature.
Latest News
Standalone Sci-Fi & Fantasy Novels I Keep Recommending
These are the standalone Sci-Fi and Fantasy novels that Lizzy has loved and keeps recommending...
Li Chen visits Book Hero
We were so excited to have the incredible author and illustrator Li Chen come to...
The Book Briefing: 2nd October
Get stuck in with all the latest from the literary world including book announcements, controversies...
The Book Hero Team's September Reads
September was an especially busy month for the Book Hero team as we did the...
Come Celebrate New Zealand Bookshop Day with Us!
Next Saturday, New Zealand celebrates Bookshop Day - a day to celebrate the special place...
See moreThis is the story of Christopher Isherwood’s parents – their meeting in 1895, marriage in 1903 after his father had returned from the Boer War, and his father’s death in an assault on Ypres in 1915, which left his mother a widow until her own death in 1960.
First published in 1971, this is a key book in Isherwood's career revealing as much about him as the parents he set out to portray.
Book Hero Magic formatted this description to make it easier to read. While it's new and
still learning, it may not be perfect - your
feedback is welcome!
Description
First published in 1971, this is a key book in Isherwood's career revealing as much about him as the parents he set out to portray.
This is the story of Christopher Isherwood's parents - their meeting in 1895, marriage in 1903 after his father had returned from the Boer War, and his father's death in an assault on Ypres in 1915, which left his mother a widow until her own death in 1960.
As well as a family memoir, Kathleen and Frank is a social history of a period of striking change, and a portrait of the world which shaped Isherwood and which he rejected.
Book Hero Magic summarised reviews for this book. While it's new and still learning, it may not be perfect - your feedback is welcome! HOW HAS THIS BEEN REVIEWED?
Celebrated for its insightful portrayal and clear, precise writing, the book has been praised as a moving account based on personal letters and diaries. Critics note its depth and the compelling character studies within, highlighting its significance both as a social history and a memoir.
Book Details
INFORMATION
ISBN: 9780099561194
Publisher: Vintage Publishing
Format: Paperback / softback
Date Published: 23 May 2013
Country: United Kingdom
Imprint: Vintage Classics
Audience: General / adult
DIMENSIONS
Spine width: 38.0mm
Width: 129.0mm
Height: 198.0mm
Weight: 483g
Pages: 528
About the Author
Christopher Isherwood was born in 1904. He began to write at university and later moved to Berlin, where he gave English lessons to support himself. He witnessed first hand the rise to power of Hitler and the Nazi party in Germany and some of his best works, such as Mr. Norris Changes Trains and Goodbye to Berlin, draw on these experiences. He created the character of Sally Bowles, later made famous as the heroine of the musical Cabaret. Isherwood travelled with W.H Auden to China in the late 1930s before going with him to America in 1939. He died on 4 January 1986. His novel A Single Man was recently made into an award-winning film by Tom Ford, starring Colin Firth and Julianne Moore.
Also by Christopher Isherwood
View all-
Goodbye to Berlin
VINTAGE DECO – Nine blazing, daring novels to celebrate the 1920s – 100 years on. Goodbye to Berlin is the novella that inspired Cabaret, evoking the glamour and sleaze, excess and repression of Berlin society. Isherwood depicts the lives of people under threat from the rise of the Nazis: a wealthy Jewish heiress, Natalia Landauer; a gay couple, Peter and...Paperback$2400Elsewhere:$2600Unit price /UnavailableIn StockShips today -
A Single Man
A Single Man is an exclusive Vintage Classic that has been made into a film starring Julianne Moore and Colin Firth, directed by Tom Ford. Isherwood's short, poignant novel is a tender and wistful love story. Celebrated as a masterpiece from its first publication, A Single Man is the story of George, an English professor in suburban California left heartbroken...Paperback$2400Elsewhere:$2600Unit price /UnavailableIn StockShips today -
Goodbye to Berlin
The best prose writer in English - Gore Vidal As Cabaret returns to the West End, revisit the KitKat Club in the book that introduced Sally Bowles to the world. Set in the 1930s, Goodbye to Berlin is the novella that inspired Cabaret, evoking the glamour and sleaze, excess and repression of Berlin society. Isherwood shows the lives of people...Paperback$2400Elsewhere:$2600Unit price /UnavailableIn StockShips today -
The Berlin Novels
Two acclaimed novels based on Isherwood's experiences in pre-war Berlin, together in one volume. Christopher Isherwood offers fascinating insight into pre-war Berlin. Mr Norris Changes Trains The first of Christopher Isherwood's classic Berlin novels, this portrays the encounter and growing friendship between young William Bradshaw and the urbane and mildly sinister Mr Norris. Piquant, witty and oblique, it vividly evokes...Paperback$3200Elsewhere:$3500Unit price /UnavailableIn StockShips today -
Lost Years
His writing soon becomes addictive as one self-disclosure follows another. What better recommendation for a diary could there be? - The Times Christopher Isherwood settled in California in 1939 and spent the war years writing for Hollywood. By 1945, however, he had all but ceased to write fiction and even abandoned his habit of keeping a diary. Instead, he embarked...Paperback$5000Unit price /UnavailableIn StockShips today -
Isherwood on Writing
Isherwood's lectures on writing and writers, now all available for the first time In the 1960s, Christopher Isherwood gave an unprecedented series of lectures at California universities about his life and work. During this time, Isherwood, who would liberate the memoir and become the founding father of modern gay writing, spoke openly for the first time about his craft—on writing...Paperback$5799Unit price /UnavailableAvailableShips in 4-6 weeks -
A Meeting by the River
A deeply satisfying novel of sibling rivalry, sexuality and spirituality. Breaking a long silence, Oliver, a young Englishman, writes to his elder brother, Patrick. Oliver, the idealistic younger brother, is living in a Hindu Monastery and has decided to take his final monastic vows. Patrick, a successful, long-married publisher, newly in love with a boy in Los Angeles, decides to...Paperback$2800Elsewhere:$2999Unit price /UnavailableAvailableShips in 4-6 weeks -
Pre-orderSally Bowles
Relish a BRIEF ENCOUNTER with Christopher Isherwood, the master chronicler of 1930s Berlin, with this dazzling tale of glamour and decadence, poverty and ambition. Sally Bowles is the dazzling centrepiece of Goodbye to Berlin, distilling Isherwood's genius into the tale of one bawdy, brilliant woman. 1930s Berlin is a realm of glamour and sleaze, repression and excess, threatened by a...Paperback$2400Unit price /UnavailableOut 20 Oct 2026Pre-order -
All the Conspirators
All the Conspirators by Christopher Isherwood is his debut novel, featuring the first generation of Angry Young Men. The scene is 1920s Kensington, where Philip and Joan are testing the very limits of politeness and restraint as they fight to expunge the oppression of their mother—by whatever means necessary. In his first novel, Christopher Isherwood paints an intimate portrait of...PaperbackSold Out -
A Single Man
A Single Man is an exclusive Vintage Classic that has been made into a film starring Julianne Moore and Colin Firth and directed by Tom Ford. In this brilliantly perceptive novel, a middle-aged professor living in California is alienated from his students by differences in age and nationality, and from the rest of society by his homosexuality. Isherwood explores the...PaperbackSold Out
More from Biography & Memoir
View all-
New ReleaseSwan Song
Beautiful. Beloved. Hunted. The extraordinary life and death of Diana, as told by her brother, Charles – available to pre-order now. ‘When asked, ‘What was it like, growing up with Diana?’, my first thought is always, But I don’t know what it was like not to grow up with her…’ In September 1997, Charles Spencer stood in Westminster Abbey before...Hardback$5499Elsewhere:$6500Unit price /UnavailableIn StockShips today -
New ReleaseFictional Selves
From the beloved actor and star of Twin Peaks, Blue Velvet and Sex and the City comes a candid and deeply personal memoir. In this highly anticipated memoir, the beloved actor and star of Twin Peaks, Blue Velvet, Sex and the City and more shares his utterly original account of his offbeat journey in Hollywood, his battles with fear and...Hardback$4799Elsewhere:$6000Unit price /UnavailableIn StockShips today -
New ReleaseThe Steps
The long-awaited memoir from a true Hollywood icon. We know Sylvester Stallone as one of the most revered actors, writers, and directors of all time, yet his life story is every bit as dramatic, intense, and inspiring as his greatest creations on screen. Bringing together a no-holds-barred account of a fascinating life with messages of hope, positivity, and resilience, in...Paperback$3299Elsewhere:$3999Unit price /UnavailableIn StockShips today -
Home Again
Join rock-legend, former Shihad frontman and lead singer of The Adults, Jon Toogood in this unflinching and no-holds-barred memoir Home Again.This is more than a rock story. Toogood looks back on a 37-year career that helped define New Zealand rock music, and the personal cost that came with it. From a music-obsessed childhood in Wellington to the deafening roar of international stages, this...Paperback$3199Elsewhere:$3999Unit price /UnavailableIn StockShips today -
Dogs, Boys and Other Things I've Cried About
From the social media superstar behind @SimonSits, Isabel Klee--known for her heartwarming tales of dog rescue--comes an utterly winning memoir about a twentysomething woman's search for true love in New York City and the dogs who helped her find it. A Jersey girl by birth, Isabel Klee had always wanted to live in New York City. At age 20, she...Paperback$3299Elsewhere:$3999Unit price /UnavailableIn StockShips today -
Famesick
Chronicling the tumultuous decade between the premiere of Girls to her 2021 shotgun wedding (minus the baby, because she has no uterus), Lena Dunham takes us through her journey with her trademark mix of humor, unsparing honesty, and keen eye for detail. We peek behind the scenes - of her work, her family, her relationships, and her battle to reclaim her body...Paperback$3299Elsewhere:$3500Unit price /UnavailableIn StockShips today -
This Angry Pen of Mine
This Angry Pen of Mine by Layne Staley invites you to dive into the untold creative world of Layne Staley, the legendary voice behind Alice in Chains. This extraordinary collection showcases his handwritten lyrics, deeply personal poetry, stunning original artwork, rare photos, fan tributes, and so much more. Step into the world of Layne Staley like never before. For the...Hardback$7299Elsewhere:$8999Unit price /UnavailableIn StockShips today -
Signed Copy
Stakes
Read our interview with author Noelle McCarthy! A darkly funny, sparkling follow-up to the author’s bestselling memoir Grand. You have to invite him in. You have to want the vampire’s badness in the house with you. Growing up in Catholic Ireland, Noelle McCarthy is captivated by Bram Stoker’s Dracula. The vampire is a risk-free fantasy, a suave alternative to the fraught realities...Paperback$3199Elsewhere:$4000Unit price /UnavailableIn StockShips today -
Built for This
Raised among strong women, butcher's benches, and hard ideas about what men are meant to be, Brad Poulter grows up knowing he's different long before he has the words for it. But in late '90s small-town New Zealand, 'different' isn't discussed, it's managed. Joining the Royal New Zealand Navy offers escape, certainty, and belonging. The rules are clear, the uniform...Paperback$3199Elsewhere:$3799Unit price /UnavailableIn StockShips today -
Even the Good Girls Will Cry
Thanks to a thrown beer bottle and a fan letter to a P.O. box, Melissa Auf der Maur's first band scored an opening slot for the Smashing Pumpkins in her bohemian home town, Montreal. Sensing Melissa's talent, Billy Corgan recommended her to Courtney Love. Whisked from her local scene, Melissa joined Hole just after the deaths of Kurt Cobain and...Paperback$3199Elsewhere:$3999Unit price /UnavailableIn StockShips today -
An Ocean and a Day
An utterly riveting, moving and poignant memoir of grief and loss that will speak to anyone who's ever lost someone they love. An Ocean and a Day is Hannah Richell's personal account of losing her husband, Matt, in a surfing accident on Tamarama beach in 2014. It is the story of the grief journey she travelled over the first two...Paperback$3199Elsewhere:$3799Unit price /UnavailableIn StockShips today -
A Place to Stand
A Place to Stand by Clare Ward is a profound memoir that delves into the life of a country doctor living and working in the Hokianga Harbour area in the far north of Aotearoa New Zealand. This region is sparsely populated and poses numerous health challenges. This thoughtful account details Clare’s thirty-year career, highlighting the people she works with and...Hardback$3199Elsewhere:$3799Unit price /UnavailableIn StockShips today
Why buy from us?
Book Hero is not a chain store or big box retailer. We're an independent 100% NZ-owned business on a mission to help more Kiwis rediscover a love of books and reading!
Service & Delivery
Our warehouse in Auckland holds over 100,000 books, toys, board games and puzzles in-stock so you're not waiting for your order to arrive from overseas.
Auckland Bookstore
We're primarily an online store, but for your convenience you can pick up your order for free from our bookstore, which is right next door to our warehouse in Hobsonville.
Our Gifting Service
Books make wonderful thoughtful gifts and we're here to help with gift-wrapping and cards. We can even send your gift directly to your loved one.
Biography & Memoir lists from the team
Explore our curated lists from our heroes to find your next read!
-
![]()
![]()
![]()
Lizzy's listBiography & Memoir
Memorable Memoirs of Kiwi Women
Looking for an amazing local memoir of one of the many amazing women here in Aotearoa? Here's a great list, featuring some...View the list -
![]()
![]()
![Lucky You're Tough]()
Lizzy's listBiography & Memoir
Memorable Memoirs of Kiwi Men
Looking for an amazing local memoir of one of the many amazing men here in Aotearoa? Here's a great list, featuring some...View the list
