WHEN Kate had decided, at the age of fifty-five, to reduce her working hours and go part-time at her job, she had imagined filling her extra days off with all kinds of exciting adventures. Instead, sh

AMELIA arrives home from her half-day at work. She has the week’s shopping and quickly squirrels everything away, leaving just her children’s magazines on the kitchen table. Seeing she only has three-

IT was one of those overheard snatches of conversations that immediately makes you keen to hear the rest of it. “You know, I really wasn’t in the mood to go,” the woman on the seat in front of me was

I LIFT my head to the weak sun and give thanks for having survived another winter. It’s good to see the lane is passable, even if there are ruts and puddles. However, I can still see the bones of icy,

YOU can’t just throw it all in a skip, Mum!” Bryony’s voice was muffled by a dust mask as she crouched in the loft space, carefully avoiding bumping her head on the beams. She examined a battered trun

Apart from the For Sale board, the house didn’t look any different from the last time I was here. Six months ago now. The day of my father’s funeral. A memory of how fragile my mother appeared that da