A page-turning, involving read that makes you ask big questions about the world and its prejudices. Liberating and uplifting

— Jackie Kay

This book-club read has echoes of Revolutionary Road. Delicate, but feistily written

— Elle

Shaw’s writing is lovely: elegant, subtle and haunting

— The Times

A secret love affair which has the whole town talking, and a small boy very worried.

Lydia Weekes is distraught at the break-up of her marriage. When her young son Charlie makes friends with the town’s doctor, Jean Markham, her life is turned upside down.

Charlie tells his secrets to no one but the bees, but even he can’t keep his mother’s friendship to himself. The locals don’t like things done differently. As Lydia and the doctor become closer, the rumours start to fly and threaten to shatter Charlie’s world.

Powerfully exposes the wrenches of prejudice… A tender and unikley page-turner

— Financial Times

It gripped me like a vice, and I stopped doing anything else to get to the end

— Andrew Davis