Appleby House is Sylvia Smiths delightful, refreshingly candid account of a year spent in a shabby bed-sit in1980s Londons East End.Smiths engrossing, understated narrative invests the story of shared living: shifting allegiances, cleaning negotiations, debates about whose turn it is to change the toilet paper (its color-coded) and whos been stealing whose hot water (50p buys 2 baths) with compulsive suspense of the highest order. As tensions build around Lauras adamant refusal to turn down her music or pretend to care about what her housemates have to say, we find ourselves astonishingly addicted to the goings on in this tiny corner of the universe. In the most artless and amusing way, Appleby House thoroughly indulges our very human fascination with the day-to-day and the surprising, often inexplicable, behavior of our fellow members of the species.From the Trade Paperback edition.