You've excelled at university, got a good job, wed the person of your choice and brought up your children - but what happens next? Sue Gee's tenth novel focuses on the experiences of two long-time friends who, after fulfilling careers in literary teaching and long, loving marriages, are facing retirement and old age.

Warm-hearted Dido is concerned by her youngest son's relationship with his girlfriend, but soon finds her own marriage beset by problems. Meanwhile, independent-minded Georgia is struggling to keep a lid on her emotions a year after husband Henry's death - not helped by the diffidence of her daughter.

Gee keeps her settings small and intimate, but the details of each are so finely drawn that the domestic drama becomes as all-encompassing as an epic. Her gift for observation extends to her wonderfully rounded characters - from Georgia's confused, lovesick daughter Chloe to semi-senile cousin Maud, you're made to empathise with the thoughts and feelings of everyone you encounter.

At the heart of the novel is the central characters' love of literature and its impact on the way they cope with the crises they face every day. Authors' quotations and analyses are so carefully woven into the text that you hardly realise they're there until the characters start to find that books can offer them no more help or solace.

Gee - an academic herself - draws the reader toward the conclusion that whether you read for pleasure, solace or academic gain, there comes a time when you have to lift your head from the page and face up to your life.

  • Lisa Thiel