This is a unique reference book and an invaluable companion for even the most informed Anthony Powell fan. A Dance to the Music of Time is a literary landmark of twentieth-century writing. As the reader cavorts through the 12-volume novel alongside the narrator Nicholas Jenkins, it soon becomes apparent that he too inevitably confuses dates and events, but in her dedicated research Hilary Spurling tidies up the most minute of detail into its proper place. More than a simple glossary, Invitation to the Dance contains extensive Character, Book, Painting and Place indices, creating a magnificent database of Powell’s imagination and England’s cultural landscape. This is a masterpiece of ‘extreme ingenuity’ detailing over four hundred characters and one million words of Powell’s lively fifty-year dance of fiction and fact.