When, with elegant disdain, Fergus announces that he is leaving Gina and their teenage daughter, Gina's misery ricochets through the two homes and she turns for emotional support to Laurence, her dearest friend.
And as Laurence gives comfort, so his own marriage and the stability of his children edges towards destruction ...
Joanna Trollope is the author of eagerly awaited and sparklingly readable novels often centred around the domestic nuaunces and dilemmas of life in present-day England. She has also written a number of historical novels and Britannia's Daughters, a study of women in the British Empire.
Joanna Trollope was born in Gloucestershire and now lives in London. She was appointed OBE in the 1996 Queen's Birthday Honours List for services to literature.