Is That You, Beth Cherry? by Lucy Dillon

Beth’s life, like the unfinished screenplay on her laptop, is stuck between chapters.

Since her breakup with Fraser – which was not part of the script – she’s retreated into a lonely WFH world of sweatpants, disordered hours and comfort eating. The one luminous constant in her life is her love for her rescue dog, Tomsk, and his for her.

When Beth’s house share falls apart, she is thrown a lifeline by the least likely person: Fraser’s mother Martine, who offers Beth and Tomsk a temporary space above her garage in which to start over. Returning to Longhampton, scene of her happiest memories with Fraser and his family, feels like a second chance: might this be a sign that she and Fraser are meant to be?

But when Beth is recruited as a writer for a project called The Story of Your Life, she starts to gain more perspective on her own life. Run by the local retirement community, some of the stories she hears are heartwarming, some are heartbreaking. All of them, Beth notes, reveal a little more than the teller realises. And when she is sent an anonymous story of first love that threatens to destroy more than one family’s identity, Beth has to decide: is it sometimes better to keep a secret than reveal the truth?