Unsafe Attachments

'On a summer evening, if you stand still and listen, you can hear the whole honeycomb of the city ticking and humming with infidelity...' IUnsafe Attachments/I explores the relationships of a loosely interlinked group of Londoners. Caught off guard at key points, they face moments of sudden temptation in their busy, established lives, as well as increasingly difficult choices. Dinah, harried and pregnant, is haunted by images of death on her way to Heathrow. Abi, a senior civil servant, embarks upon an affair with a Nigerian journalist as her teenage daughter 'kind of shags' her teacher. Alex, increasingly keen to settle down, numbly accompanies his ex-girlfriend to an abortion clinic. A glance at a party turns into a fumbling grope and then a guilty hangover for Roger, whose live-in girlfriend is smugly satisfied that her life is on course. Lonely caf-owner Carey spots his married shrink passionately kissing another woman in a park. Tina's desperate wish for a child jeopardises everything that is important to her. Relationships are acutely observed the delights and tensions of living together, cheating on one another and trying to make lasting connections in this vast modern city. Love real or imaginary causes hearts to crack and lives to crumble but there is also hope, and sometimes there are second chances. This enticing collection buzzes with a passion for human life in all its complexity. Here, deftly delineated, are alluring women and compromised professionals, footloose mothers and heartless boys, the confused, the conscientous and the carefree. Racily told with wit and brio, these stories introduce a stunning new voice in women's fiction.