The London Train [Paperback]

Hadleyis a lovely, subtly teasing writer. —New York Times Book Review

Twolives, stretched between two cities, converge in a chance meeting withimmediate and far-reaching consequences in this compelling, sophisticated talefrom acclaimedNew Yorkerwriter Tessa Hadley, author ofAccidents inthe HomeandThe Master Bedroom. As father struggles to reestablisha relationship with his estranged daughter in London, surrendering himself toan underground life of illegal squats and counterculture friendships, a wifedecides she must flee her suffocating marriage to return to Wales, where inCardiff she may rediscover the passions that once fueled her life. Embracingchange and facing loss, in a story evocative of Alice Munro’sRunawayandJulia Glass’I See You Everywhere, Hadley’s powerful charactersilluminate the furthest reaches of love, hope, and determination.

Unsettled by the recent death of his mother, Paul sets out in search of Pia, his daughter from his first marriage, who has disappeared into the labyrinth of London. Discovering her pregnant and living illegally in a run-down council flat with a pair of Polish siblings, Paul is entranced by Pia’s excitement at living on the edge. Abandoning his second wife and their children in Wales, he joins her to begin a new life in the heart of London.

Cora, meanwhile, is running in the opposite direction, back to Cardiff, to the house she has inherited from her parents. She is escaping her marriage, and the constrictions and disappointments of her life in London. But there is a deeper reason why she cannot stay with her decent Civil Service husband—the aftershocks of which she hasn’t fully come to terms with herself.