The Whole Day Through

Fourth Estate, London 2009. Faded and creased spine, inscription on front endpaper, otherwise good secondhand condition.

When forty-something Laura Lewis is obliged to abandon a life of stylish independence in Paris to care for her elderly mother in Winchester, it seems all romantic opportunities have gone up in smoke. Then she runs into Ben, the great love of her student days - and, as she only now dares admit, the emotional yardstick by which she has judged every man since. Are they brave enough to take the second chance at the lasting happiness that fate has offered them? Or will they be defeated by the need, instilled in childhood, to do what they think is the right thing? Taking place over a single summer's day, The Whole Day Through is a bittersweet love story, shot through with an understanding of mortality, memory and the difficulty of being good. Patrick Gale writes with scrupulous candour about the tests of love: the regrets and the triumphs, and the melancholy of failing. The Whole Day Through is vintage Gale, and displays the same combination of wit, tenderness and acute psychological observation as his bestselling Notes From an Exhibition.