The Stromness Dinner

Ed fits kitchens in the small family business in London, and he’s wondering if there isn’t more to life. So when Marcus, a client in banking, offers him an extra job refurbishing a cottage in Stromness, he thinks, why not? Orkney is certainly a welcome change of scene from Bermondsey, and the work’s easy enough. Then Marcus’ sister Claire arrives, all city power and perfume, and events take an unexpected turn. The Stromness Dinner is an offbeat, entirely readable novel about relationships. Beautifully observed and gently humorous, it is a very human and contemporary story about how we live today, and what happens when two people follow their dreams. Peter Benson has created a new sort of ‘hero’ in Ed Beech, whose homespun philosophy of life stays in the memory long after the novel ends.

Peter Benson is the author of eight novels and winner of the Guardian Fiction Prize, the Encore Award, and the Somerset Maugham Award. He has also published short stories, screenplays, and poetry, and his work has been adapted for television and radio, and translated into several languages. His previous novel, The South in Winter (2017), was published by Alma Books.