A wife. A husband. A lover. A chance to leave her ordinary life? There had been no rain for weeks; the air crackled, the brushfires burned, her childhood ended. The summer of 1970 - a whisper from her mother's lips told a secret that would destroy her family - a burden too heavy for a young girl to carry. Sylvia Sandon swore then and there she would never become her mother. Now Sylvia is walking the same illicit path towards temptation - into an affair she feels powerless to resist. The man she married, the father of her children, lies next to her in bed. The breathing that once lulled her to sleep now grating on her nerves. Sylvia has a chance to leave this ordinary life. Behind her are the ravaged remains of her childhood, in front the bittersweet safety of family life...or the exquisite torment of infidelity. One woman. Two paths. A forbidden moment of happiness or a lifetime of quiet regret. 'Astonishingly moving and complex' The Boston Globe