Out of the Picture

By Polly Samson

Quite unlike her fair stepsisters, Lizzie is dark and secretive: 'Just like your father' says her mother. But what was her father like? Photos of him are hidden away; snatches of overheard conversation between her mother and her stepfather deepen the mystery. Only her best friend Savannah - also abandoned by her father when she was a baby - knows what it feels like to wonder, to try and piece together an earlier story. But when events propel Lizzie alone to London she stops wondering and starts searching...

Beautifully evoking the ache of childhood loss, the scrappy joys of chaotic families, and the hurt and relief of understanding, OUT OF THE PICTURE reveals Polly Samson's talent for laying bare the uncomfortable truths that lie just under the skin - in every family, in every secret.

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 1844088065
• ISBN13: 9781844088065
• Release Date: April 2012
• Publisher: Little Brown and Co. (UK)
• Length: 246 Pages
• Weight: 0.40 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.7" x 4.9" x 7.7"
• Age Range: 18 years and up
• Grade Range: Postsecondary

Customer Reviews

A delight

To argue that this is a run-of-the-mill piece of modern fiction is to do it perhaps the greatest disservice. I doubt any author of the past two decades has been able to so successfully capture the nuances and insecurities of the human psyche as well as Polly Samson has in her debut novel. Dialogue is crisp and flows with the narration; no one ever says something that the reader cannot understand, so astute is the writers characterisation. The heartache of the lead character may relate directly to Samson's own youth, or that of her son - I have no idea, or desire to know. Regardless, everyone will be able to identify with her desires, her sense of loss and pain, and above all, the never-ending search for something better.It is a delightful book, which deserves to be read and re-read.