Lisa Blower – författare

The title is a Potteries' saying that means it's looking a bit bleak, a little like rain - an expression that sums up this fabulous debut collection of award-winning stories by Lisa Blower. Blower celebrates her characters with stories that they wouldn't want told. She makes the bleak funny, in a voice reminiscent of Alan Bennett, and strikes a new chord in regional and working-class fiction.

One Monday afternoon, around three o'clock, pond supplies salesman Selwyn Robby arrives home towing the Toogood Aquatics exhibition caravan and orders his like-wife, Imogen 'Ginny' Dare, to get into the car. He's taking her on a little holiday, he says. To Wales. So begins their road trip west via ponds, pitstops, and blasts from Selwyn's past.

One Monday afternoon, around three o'clock, pond supplies salesman Selwyn Robby arrives home towing the Toogood Aquatics exhibition caravan and orders his like-wife, Imogen 'Ginny' Dare, to get into the car. He's taking her on a little holiday, he says. To Wales. So begins their road trip west via ponds, pitstops, and blasts from Selwyn's past.