Summer Day

ISBN-13: 9781544120959 / Angielski / Miękka / 2017 / 266 str.

Frank Parker

Opis

Bess, a Welsh Collie sheepdog, is old and ailing. Jack, her owner, has decided it is time to put her down. His young son, Henry, tries to prevent this, causing Jack's gun to go off injuring Jack. Believing he is responsible for his father's death, Henry runs away, taking Bess with him. Will this summer day be the last of Bess's life? Or of Henry's? Set on a Welsh Border hill farm in 1947, a time and place lacking land-line phones, let alone broadband, the story follows Henry's desperate attempts to evade capture, and the amateurish efforts of family and neighbours to find him and explain that his father's injuries are not life threatening and no-one holds him responsible. Each member of the family has his or her own fears for the future and these influence their behaviour throughout the long sultry day as storm clouds gather. Henry's older brother, Cecil, wants to have a bigger say in the running of the farm, his mother and his sister, Margery, are preoccupied with planning her forthcoming marriage. His aunts, too, have problems that demand attention. Assorted professionals have their own distorted view of the family and of Henry: the family Doctor, the district nurse, the vicar, the school teacher. Henry, meanwhile, faces an escalating series of set-backs and injuries which lead him to make a near fatal decision.