Lovers and Newcomers. Rosie Thomas
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Lovers and Newcomers
Rosie Thomas
Published by HarperCollinsPublishers Ltd 1 London Bridge Street London SE1 9GF
First published in Great Britain by HarperCollinsPublishers 2010
Copyright © Rosie Thomas 2010
Cover layout design © HarperCollinsPublishers Ltd 2016 Jacket photographs © Shutterstock.com
Rosie Thomas asserts the moral right to be identified as the author of this work.
A catalogue copy of this book is available from the British Library.
This novel is entirely a work of fiction. The names, characters and incidents portrayed in it are the work of the author’s imagination. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events or localities is entirely coincidental.
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Source ISBN: 9780007285945
Ebook Edition © April 2016 ISBN: 9780007321513
Version: 2016-04-20
To Theo
Contents
Keep Reading: Daughter of the House
The old house has been cold and empty for so long, but now it’s stirring. A joint of the oak stair treads releases a sudden sharp snap, a window left open for air rattles in a gust of wind, and the scent of baking rises from the kitchen.
The place is coming back to life around me.
I am making cakes for tea, and already I have looked into each of the guest rooms at least three times in order to enjoy the sight of folded towels and the little jugs of flowers placed on chests of drawers. Meadow flowers from Mead fields; oxeye daisies, and cow parsley, which has shed a faint dust of grey pollen on the waxed wood. I reach out to sweep away the powder with my little finger, before deciding that it looks pretty as it is.
Not that my old friends will be guests, of course.