Book description
The Alldens live in a ramshackle house in suburban Bath. Don and Emily
have four children: confident Liz, satirical Clive, shy Lotte, and
Benjamin, the late arrival. Together they take the usual knocks, go to
work, go abroad, go to university, go to pieces. Don and Emily stick it
out, their strong marriage tested by experience and frustrated by love
for Clive, the ardent boxing fan at odds with himself, their special
child.
But then ordinary is special, too, as the Alldens will discover thirty
years later when Emily falls ill and her children come home to say
goodbye. They meet on the poor outskirts of the city in which they grew
up, a place where strangers gather and Emily lingers, present but
missing, at the still centre of a changing world.
This Is Paradise
is an unflinching portrayal of the dynamics of family life. The Alldens
are wholly recognizable and defiantly unique, close allies and closer
adversaries who think they know each other. Their unforgettable story is
an intimate record of survival that is tender, funny and ultimately
heartbreaking. Will Eaves was born in Bath in 1967. He is the author
of two other novels, The Oversight
(2001) and Nothing To Be Afraid
Of
(2005), and a collection of poems, Sound Houses
(2011). For many years he was the arts editor of the Times Literary
Supplement
. He now teaches at the University of Warwick.
