The re-dipping of dishes was a small matter, but the emotional texture of married life is made up of small matters. This one had become invested with a fatal quality.

Imogen, the beautiful and much younger wife of distinguished barrister Evelyn Gresham, is facing the greatest challenge of her married life. Their neighbour Blanche Silcox, competent, middle-aged and tweedy - the very opposite of Imogen - seems to be vying for Evelyn's attention. And to Imogen's increasing disbelief, she may be succeeding.

With exquisite elegance and irony, The Tortoise and the Hare reveals that in affairs of the heart, the race is not always won by the swift - or the fair.

Introduced by Hilary Mantel

'The perfection of its tone and prose is matched by an anguished wit' Amanda Craig, Guardian

'Wonderfully sinister, so enchantingly written and so sad. Everyone should read it' Jilly Cooper

'A subtle and beautiful book . . . Very few authors combine her acute psychological insight with her grace and style' Hilary Mantel