Better Days

Twenty years ago, Grace wanted nothing more than to be with Trent - a boy with a guitar and a lot of promises. Twenty years ago, Dorothy wanted nothing more than for her daughter to fulfil her potential.

In a moment of heartbreak and fury, Grace makes a split-second decision to board a plane to London and put an ocean between them. There, Grace takes a job answering calls for a wannabe music mogul and sends her life on a dazzling trajectory, resulting in an illustrious career managing a megastar, large houses in glamorous places, two children (one who might be a sociopath but the other seems fine) and marriage to Ed. Ed who would do anything for her ... except move back in.

Now, Grace is dragging her kids and a particularly irritating dachshund to her childhood home, where Dorothy is waiting with a roast and inevitable questions about where it all went wrong. On a McDonald-s pitstop, among fractious kids and a runaway dog, she bumps into a ghost from the past ... Trent.

Claire Zorn perfectly encapsulates the pitfalls of fledgling adulthood and the -what ifs- of later life. She explores how the demands of being an adult - career, marriage, motherhood - can chip away at who we are, and she accomplishes it with writing that is compassionate, creative, funny and thought-provoking.