Neighbours and strangers

Margaret Forster, who died on 8 February, excelled at writing about complex relationships between women. Even old friends, she demonstrated, can experience jealousy, disapproval or dislike.

Here, ‘Sarah’ has changed her name to live incognito on the west coast of Cumbria, in a town chosen at random. When she gets locked out of her house, a bond is formed between her and her elderly neighbour Nancy — whose deceased friend Amy once owned Sarah’s rental and left Nancy a key.

Although Sarah is ostensibly the one with ‘a past’ (prison), it was Nancy whom I found most interesting. She first appears as a typical busybody, spying from her window, curmudgeonly and suspicious, particularly about ‘Amy’s lad’ who inherited ‘next door’. After Amy’s funeral, Nancy had been enraged by his leaving a pot plant on her doorstep: ‘for the help given to our beloved sister and aunt’. ‘Beloved!…. Not given to her, properly… only a chrysanthemum.’