Overflowing Nothings and Threadbare Everythings: A debut contemporary novel of family, resilience, hidden dangers

What do you do when the line between love and hate proves needle-thin?Naomi Taylor considers herself a devoted wife and mother, though the bruises left by her husband map her apparent failings. Rejecting her friend's plea to leave, determined to keep her family together, Naomi is summoned to face the years-long erosion of her identity. But with the COVID lockdown edging in, and time and options running out, Naomi must protect herself and her daughter as their world quickly crumbles around them.Nearby, cocky and commitment-shy Tom Grayson is unnerved when his new girlfriend moves in, then terrified when she makes a shock revelation that upends his life. Confronted with the guilt of abandoning his son, he's buoyed by a brief lockdown encounter with Naomi and her daughter, and dares to hope that perhaps he isn't beyond redemption. But when his girlfriend turns abusive, weaponising his grief and forbidding reconnection with his son, Tom is trapped in a new life he's expected to build while mourning the one he left behind.Overflowing Nothings and Threadbare Everythings is a homage to the extremes of cruelty and compassion, to the courage we find in desperate moments, and to the brief but pivotal encounters that can alter the course of a life forever.

Pagina's: 382, Paperback, Carly Ratcliffe