Friday 10th January | 12:15pm - Dear Mrs Bird by AJ Pearce

London, 1941. Emmeline Lake and her best friend Bunty are trying to stay cheerful despite the Luftwaffe making life thoroughly annoying for everyone. Emmy dreams of becoming a Lady War Correspondent and when she spots a job advertisement in the newspaper she seizes her chance – but after a rather unfortunate misunderstanding, she finds herself typing letters for the formidable Henrietta Bird, the renowned agony aunt of Woman’s Friendmagazine.

 

Mrs Bird is very clear: letters containing any form of Unpleasantness must go straight into the bin. But as Emmy reads the desperate pleas from women who may have Gone Too Far with the wrong man, or can't bear to let their children be evacuated, she decides the only thing for it is to secretly write back . . .

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Friday 7th February | 12:15pm - The Château by William Maxwell

It is 1948 and a young American couple arrive in France for a holiday, full of anticipation and enthusiasm. But the countryside and people are war-battered, and their reception at the Chateau Beaumesnil is not all the open-hearted Americans could wish for.

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Friday 7th March | 12:15pm - Caledonian Road by Andrew O'Hagan

Campbell Flynn - art historian and celebrity pundit - is entering the empire of middle age. Fuelled by an appetite for controversy and novelty, he doesn't take people half as seriously as they take themselves. Which will prove the first of his huge mistakes.

 

The second? Milo Mangasha, his beguiling and provocative student. Milo inhabits a more precarious world. He has experiences and ideas that excite his teacher. He also has a plan.

 

Over the course of an incendiary year a web of secrets and crimes will be revealed, and Campbell Flynn may not be able to protect himself from the shattering exposure of all his privilege really involves. But then, he always knew: when his life came tumbling down, it would occur in public.