'You start alone, you finish alone,' she says: 'It's fine to be alone, it's a revelation, truth at last.'

This is the story of Almayer Jenkin's progress through life, from a motherless childhood through adult love affairs and her own experience of motherhood. In this novel, vivid and spare, touching and comic, A. L. Barker draws a fine portrait of Almayer and the diverse people she meets and lives among.

'I know nothing of A. L. Barker, except that she writes like an angel and I love her.' Auberon Waugh

'A novel that deserves to be cherished, as A. L. Barker so plainly cherishes her characters. She has a rare ability to illuminate the remarkable qualities of commonplace things, and a profound sympathy for us all, liable as we all are to being knocked over by very little at any time.' New York Magazine