Product Description

Anthony Cartwrights first novel, winner of a Betty Trask award, is a novel of sharp social observation and compassion exploring the effects of changes in a community upon a family in postindustrial Dudley.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #338114 in Books
• Published on: 2004-04-01
• Original language: English
• Number of items: 1
• Dimensions: .60 pounds
• Binding: Paperback
• 256 pages

Review
"No doubt about it. Anthony Cartwright can certainly write. This is a painfully honest and accomplished first novel, a grimly realistic account of a working-class Black Country family at home and at work and at play, so utterly faithful to the world it sets out to recreate that one has to admire it. Vivid and dramatic, it penetrates beneath the skin of young and old. We are given no more than the remnants of the old working-class world of warmth and solidarity, one that has now had its heart torn out, but what afterglow there is comes from the portrait of the mother, Mary, and her 'little victories of life over death.'"

Waterstone's Books Quarterly, Spring 2004
"This is an exceptional debut ... comic and poignant by turns ... a vivid portrayal of a family under duress".

The Daily Mirror, April 2, 2004
"Set in the author’s hometown of Dudley, this heartfelt family drama takes place over 1995’s long, hot summer".