Love Lane

About the book

'Miraculous, mischievous and quietly devastating, Love Lane is the irresistible story of five individuals, linked by the past and yet separated by the present. I have just fallen in love with a beautiful book' Rachel Joyce

'With Love Lane, Gale gets right to the secret joys and hidden heartbreaks of ordinary, flawed family life. A tender, delicately devastating novel' Sarah Waters

'I adored this book. Patrick Gale's writing glows with compassion, as does his subtle, unflinching insight into his characters. Love Lane is an engulfing, deeply humane novel about the triumphs and failures of human connection' Marina Kemp

A reunion. A journey. A longing for a place called home...

When veteran Canadian wheat farmer, Harry Cane is obliged to sell up and sail home to an England transformed by two world wars, his arrival triggers unwelcome self-examination for the family he abandoned, and for whom he has never been more than a distant myth.

His daughter feels duty bound to take him in but is riven with doubt and ambushed by a long buried anger she has never before expressed. Harry's effect on the next generation is less predictable, and enables his granddaughter to deal with an unspeakable trauma, while her gentle husband feels seen for who he truly is.

Can Harry stay and make a new life before it's too late, or will he find himself cast out again, punished for having witnessed and understood too much?

LOVE LANE is a searing portrayal of escape and entrapment, and a powerful exploration of what home and family can really be.

' Love Lane is the story of a family, told beautifully and with deep understanding. There is no judgement here, only humanity. A joy and a lesson for our time' Ann Cleeves

'An involving story of reconciliation, secrets and compromises, rich in emotional truth and evocative historical detail' Clare Chambers

'I adored it. One of the most atmospheric and subtly realised novels I've read in a long while. It has the feel of a small-scale epic, filtered through distinct voices, about family and memory, estrangement and homecoming' James Cahill