But that was not the book I had planned to talk about. I wanted to talk about the book called O'Caledonia by Elspeth Barker, which I feel is having a bit of a moment right now, and rightfully so. The author actually died a couple of weeks ago, and I think as a result, a lot of people have been talking about her and this book has been popping up in discussions and in reviews and obituaries, and things like that. But prior to that, I think over the course of the last few months, it had been having a bit of a resurgence; I think Vintage just republished it with an introduction by Maggie O'Farrell. And then someone – I don't know who – but someone had recommended it to me. And I'd done what I often do, which is I'd ordered it from the London Library. Because London Library books are quite slow burn, you know, often people have them out – you know, in the London library, you can keep books out for months, one book I finally got hold of had been out for a year.! So it's just a very slow burn. So anyway, the point is, I forget all about these requisitions. And then suddenly, this brilliant package arrives in the post, and I open it – because the membership I have is where they send the books to you. And it was O'Caledonia. Great! So I only opened it just meaning to have a look, and from the very first page I was, 'oh, oh, this is going to be so good.' It's a coming-of-age story. It is, I think quite a good way to describe it as a sort of inverted I Capture the Castle, Dodie Smith's lovely, warm, romantic story about this girl growing up and sort of nutty family and living in this crumbling castle. This is like the inverse of that. It's a girl growing up in a horrible castle with a horrible family, where she's pretty miserable. She's a child, she's got a child's heart, and she's reaches out to the world around her and the adults around her. And people just do horrible things to her all the time. And there's this one line I absolutely loved, which is at one point when she's very young, and her mother has a new baby. And so it's classic sibling rivalry, she doesn't like the new baby and she takes the pram out to the garden and basically tries to bury it in leaves. And then she comes back and tells the parents so you don't have to worry, the other baby's gone. It's okay, you know, I've got rid of the other baby. And they're, you know, furious and upset with her. And there's just this one line: 'At a young age, realising she doesn't have her mother's love, a splinter, a tiny shard of ice crystal had entered her heart and lodged there.'