` Terrific, page-turning, slyly funny` India Knight` As satisfying a novel as I have read in years` Sarah Perry` Absolutely magnificent` Marian Keyes Quentin & Lottie Bredin, like many modern couples, can`t afford to divorce. Having lost their jobs in the recession, they can`t afford to go on living in London; instead, they must downsize & move their three children to a house in a remote part of Devon. Arrogant & adulterous, Quentin can`t understand why Lottie is so angry; devastated & humiliated, Lottie feels herself to have been intolerably wounded. Mud, mice & quarrels are one thing
- but why is their rent so low? What is the mystery surrounding their unappealing new home? The beauty of the landscape is ravishing, yet it conceals a dark side involving poverty, revenge, abuse & violence which will rise up to threaten them. Sally Verity, happily married but unhappily childless knows a different side to country life, as both a Health Visitor & a sheep farmer`s wife; & when Lottie`s innocent teenage son Xan gets a zero-hours contract at a local pie factory, he sees yet another. At the end of their year, the lives of all will be changed for ever. A suspenseful black comedy, this is a rich, compassionate & enthralling novel in its depiction of the English countryside, & the potentially lethal interplay between money & marriage.