4 out of 5 stars

A copy of this was provided free of charge from the publisher in return for an honest review.

Life has a way of throwing curveballs at you when you least expect it; I know I am living through one of them at the moment. For Nancy Campbell though it came in three parts. Firstly there was the pandemic, this huge disrupter to life as we had known it. On top of that, she had a phone call whilst she was in Germany. It was a call that could not be ignored and it was to tell her that her partner had had a stroke. The final curveball for her was knowing that their relationship had reached an end.

Adrift from all that she once held dear, she tries to think about what she would be best doing. There were various options but she is persuaded to spend £750 that she really doesn’t have on a caravan. It is towed to a spot between the canal and railway by a new friend called Sven. She is in good company there, others live on the canal who are on the fringes of society in Oxford and they welcome her into the community.

This is a diary of the summer months in 2021 as she adapts to her new life alone. It is full of the detail of her new life as she adapts to living in a tiny tin box. But there is much more than that in this memoir, She is very open with her thoughts and feelings, showing at times some really raw emotions and her own medical condition. She also uses her diary to reflect on the events in the wider world and the mundane moments that go to make up life.

She has a way with words that is memorising and this is a book that has life and death, love and pain in equal measure. I liked this a lot and it doesn’t feel heavily edited either, entries for some days are long and thoughtful and others are just a note of what happened that particular day. One entry was blank, quite a poignant moment in itself. This is not going to be an easy read for some people, but her calm amidst the storms that swirl around her is inspirational.

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