Ella Brightwell is heading for trouble. Successful caterer to the chattering classes, thoroughly selfish, living very comfortably, she gets news of the death of the mother she hasn't seen for 10 years. She thinks she can just nip up the motorway to Nottingham for the funeral and return to her London life unscathed. But Ella has reckoned without her large Jamaican family. Even as she enters her home town in her smart little car, she begins to feel ambushed and when she enters her mother's kitchen she is overwhelmed by the secrets and memories which lie in wait for her in her old home. Though her mother's body lies in an open coffin in the sitting-room, she is everywhere Ella looks. And there too is the huge, locked spice cupboard that had tantalised her and her brothers and sisters as youngsters. Everyone is changed, and yet, really nothing has changed at all. In this bittersweet, rites-of-passage novel, rich with Jamaican food and traditions, Ella is forced to see that reinventing yourself is one thing, but meeting your past is quite another.
- ISBN10 0708944922
- ISBN13 9780708944929
- Publish Date 1 December 2001 (first published 2 July 1998)
- Publish Status Out of Print
- Out of Print 21 October 2021
- Publish Country GB
- Imprint Ulverscroft
- Edition Large type / large print edition
- Format Hardcover
- Pages 360
- Language English