FEATHERSTONE: an attractive, small rural town serving outlying estates; bank, post office, school . . . At first glance, Kirsty Gunn's small country town is like any other - a closely connected community bound by habit and familiarity. Yet as we're invited to spend the weekend in Featherstone we come to realise there's something about the place that unsettles us, something intense and intimate that goes deep into the lives of the people who live here and bares their hearts. 'The title of Kirsty Gunn's beautiful new novel is a key - the marvellous weighting of words, how each word falls and floats on the page . . . a richly layered and rewarding novel.' Scotland on Sunday