Winter - Christopher Nicholson

In a pale November dawn the elderly Thomas Hardy walks in his garden, his beloved terrier at his heels. Within the shadows of the house sits his lonely middle-aged wife, Florence.

Both await the visit of Gertie, the leading actress in an amateur production of Tess of the D 'Urbervilles. But the arrival of this beautiful and ambitious young woman threatens the equilibrium of their reclusive life in the countryside.

In this delicately wrought novel set in the 1920s, inspired by the first English production of Tess, Christopher Nicholson presents three impassioned characters at a critical moment in their lives.

A subtle psychological portrait of a great writer in the depths of old age, Winter is also a profound examination of love and desire, and their attendant hopes and disappointments.