The Claude Glass / Tom Bullough

Set in the Welsh Borders in 1980, The Claude Glass charts an unlikely friendship between Robin, the seven-year-old son of English hippie farmers, and a neighbouring child so neglected by his impoverished parents that he is almost mute, seeking solace among the farm dogs. Through a fragment of discovered antique glass, Robin sees a rural idyll strangely distorted: a view that echoes the innocent world about to be lost to them as his parents struggle with the realities of working the land, sexual jealousy and the loss of their romantic ideals. Written with a lyricism and freshness that echoes the early work of Ian McEwan, Esther Freud or Bruce Chatwin, The Claude Glass draws you into the lives of its startling characters and their inescapable romance with nature.