(Orion, 6.99)

This is set in the American mid-West in 1972, when Ellen Grier accompanies her jobless husband and her two children to the home of her in-laws on Vinegar Hill a loveless house suffused with the settling dust of bitterness and routine. But just as Ellen seems inextricably sunk in depression, she makes a surprising discovery about her husband's long-dead grandmother, whose desperate act of rebellion inspires Ellen to rescue herself and her loved ones.