Depression may have robbed her of old age, but Virginia Woolf's spirit is still very much alive at Monk's House, her country retreat in the South Downs. It is in the accumulation of small things that you will find it, and in the atmosphere of quiet domesticity that she and her husband Leonard shared here for many years.

Part biography and part guided tour this enlightening book combines first-hand quotes, short analyses of her books, ideas and relationships, with archival images and contemporary photographs. It offers a vivid introduction to one of the most complicated and revered authors of the 20th century.