When eighteen-year-old Michael visits the Hanbury's remote family home he is captivated by their bohemian lifestyle. Years later, when he marries the strong-willed, beautiful Rebecca, he is secretly hoping to create his own version of that free-thinking family, but after the birth of their first child, their marriage begins to flounder. The chance to escape once more to his friend's country house comes as a welcome relief, until he discovers a family changed, and his own romantic notions of country life begin to disintegrate . . .

Rachel Cusk was born in 1967 and is the author of four novels: Saving Agnes, which won the Whitbread First Novel Award, The Temporary, The Country Life, which won a Somerset Maugham Award and The Lucky Ones, which was shortlisted for the Whitbread Novel Award. Her non-fiction book A Life's Work was published to huge acclaim in 2001. In 2003 she was chosen as one of Granta's Best of Young British Novelists. She lives in Bristol.