Heart and humour in abundance . . . The people on the page are real and raw' The Times After fifty years in London, Alice wants to live out her days in the land of her birth. Her children are divided on whether she stays or goes, and in the wake of their father's death, the imagined stability of the family begins to fray. Meanwhile youngest daughter Melissa has never let go of a love she lost, and Michael in return, now married to Nicole, is haunted by the failed perfection of the past. As Alice's final decision draws closer, all that is hidden between them rises to the surface . . . Set against the shadows of a city and a country in turmoil, Diana Evans's ordinary people confront fundamental questions. How should we raise our children? How to do right by our parents? And how, in the midst of everything, can we satisfy ourselves? *SHORTLISTED FOR THE ORWELL PRIZE FOR POLITICAL FICTION 2023* 'A gorgeous novel from one of our most outstanding writers' Bernardine Evaristo 'Diana Evans is fast proving herself a novelist to rank alongside Anne Tyler' Daily Mail 'A warm but devastating narrative... Like any Evans novel, it is unputdownable' Harper's Bazaar