Isobel longs so desperately for the mother who disappeared when she was small that she begins to travel, unpredictably, in time and space. But rest assured, this is not a serious, heavy read - there is a comically dysfunctional family, plenty of teenage angst, lyrically beautiful writing and glimpses into the fortunes of a family over many centuries against a haunting background of fairytale and Shakespeare's Forest of Arden.
'For whatever I want?'
'Absolutely.' (I wish, naturally, for sex with Malcolm Lovat.)
