The End of Paradise — Craig Brown

Ordinary people.  An ordinary street in southern England.  Curiosity drives us to peer through seven windows to glimpse the often dysfunctional lives of the people inside, revealing a shifting kaleidoscope of emotions: introversion, self-doubt, remorse, delusion, suppressed bitterness â€" and sometimes even time for smiling.  In Paradise Park the old order is set to change.  Time for quiet complacency is running out. 

Stephen has had enough of his past and does not recognise the future.  Billy lives with animals.  Aisling lives with her doubts and frailties.  Joan lives with the looming spectre of her other self and yields her pride.  And there's Minnie.  Minnie is soon to be 100.  Minnie is afraid of nothing and no-one, but there are those who have cause, if they did but know it, to be afraid of Minnie.  Come to the birthday party.

Do not take these ordinary people for granted.  They can be extraordinary.