Man at the Helm: Nina Stibbe

Meet Lizzie Vogel, 9.

Lizzie is concerned about her newly divorced mother; thirty-one years old and trapped in a hostile village in the English countryside with only three young children and a Labrador for company. It isn`t that having a husband is good, but in 1970s rural Leicestershire, not having one is bad. The women in the village think Lizzie`s mother is after their husbands - and no one will let the children into the Brownies!

Worried about their mother`s drinking, her (bad) playwriting and social workers sending them off to the infamous Crescent Home for Children, Lizzie and her sister embark on a misguided campaign to find their mother a new husband.