It takes considerable skill, imagination and humour to write a
novel about 'ordinary' people to whom, on the surface, very little
happens - and keep the reader gripped from page to page. However,
in this new novel, Clare Chambers, author of Learning to Swim and A
Dry Spell, has succeeded triumphantly. Philip is the least likely
of heroes: he is approaching forty, his publishing business
(dedicated to self-help titles) has gone bankrupt and the love of
his life has been forced to return to her native New Zealand. The
last straw is a discarded chip on a London pavement on which,
slightly hung-over from the previous night's New Year's Eve party,
he slips, falling awkwardly and wrenching his back. Bed-bound and
bored, he decides to spend his recovery time writing the story of
his childhood with put-upon Mum, Dad - the worst DIY operator in
the business - and Raymond, his long-emigrated brother. And so,
tentatively, Philip begins his story. It is only as it progresses
that it becomes clear - to the reader at least - that almost
unconsciously he is opening cupboard doors on to skeletons he's
only half aware of, some still all-too-solidly flesh and blood. The
revelations he conjures up stir something in his depths. For too
long he's passively accepted what life has offered to him. It's
time for him to take matters into his own hands, and make something
happen... (Kirkus UK)
On the brink of forty, newly single with a failed business, Philip thought he'd reached an all-time low. It only needed a discarded chip on a South London street to lay him literally flat. So, bedbound and bored, Philip naturally starts to write the story of his life. But the mundane catalogue of seaside holidays and bodged DIY, broken relationships and unspoken truths, reveals more surprises, both comic and touching, than Philip or his family ever bargained for. Even, perhaps, a happy ending-
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