FROM THE AUTHOR SHORTLISTED FOR THE BOOKER PRIZE (1996) AND THE WHITBREAD PRIZE (2003)

''The Mackay vision . . . as rich in history and wonder as a plain Victorian terrace house'' GUARDIAN

''A national treasure . . . She has achieved that rarest of things for a writer'' DAILY TELEGRAPH

''The romantic, bizarre, and sometimes murderous underpinnings of seemingly drab suburban lives are deftly revealed in ten densely written tales'' KIRKUS REVIEWS

An elderly woman, once an intrepid journalist, is paralysed with apprehension at the thought of meeting the daughter of her dearest friend. A budding writer is taken on a amanuensis by a famous woman novelist, with disastrous results. A would-be biographer visits a home from retired clowns . . . With her miraculously sharp eye for the telling detail, her nose for the secrets smouldering behind the most staid suburban facades, Shena Mackays's wonderful collection of short stories combine the macabre and mundane to brilliant effect.