Patrick Gale

These delightful stories are just as entertaining as Gale’s many well received novels. Particularly fond of miserable women and petulant children, the collection includes a Barbara Pym-ish skit about the denizens of a cathedral close, a cautionary tale of a bad-tempered girl who gets locked in a wardrobe, and the story of a long-suffering wife who decides it’s her turn to receive oral sex.