THE LAND IN WINTER

With the threat of another 'deep freeze' on the horizon, it seems very apt that our Book of the Moment is Andrew Miller’s ‘The Land in Winter.’ Miller transports us back to post war Britain. Set in Somerset during the month of the famous Big Freeze of 1962/63, two couples find themselves marooned in the blizzards as their lives begin to unravel. Shortlisted for the Booker Prize 2025, Miller’s novel explores theme of survival and human connection.

The book opens with a death in an asylum, the relevance of which becomes apparent later. Dr Eric Parry, a provincial Midlander and his wife Irene, have escaped London and Irene’s overbearing parents to live in a remote Somerset cottage. Eric wants to be the country doctor with the country wife. Their new neighbours are Bill and Rita Simmons. Bill, an Oxford graduate, has shunned his father’s business and bought the run-down Water Farm, with its cattle and underperforming bull! We learn his wife, Rita, had previously been a dancer in a nightclub in Bristol, whilst her father, a war veteran, is a resident in the local asylum. Whilst Eric and Bill work long hours, Irene and Rita, both in the early stages of pregnancy, find themselves lonely and isolated in their respective cottages.

As the bleak weather continues, Rita unexpectedly turns up at Irene’s doorstep with a box of eggs and an unlikely friendship is forged. The story reaches a climax when Irene hosts a Boxing Day party for the local neighbours plus her London friend Tessa, who brings a brash married playwright she is seeing. The party scene is entrancing - Rita arrives with her record collection and shows she knows how to have a good party. An alcohol infused evening ensues which inevitably opens up secrets and wounds.

Miller’s hypnotic prose and descriptions of the harsh winter give the snow and blizzards an eerie beauty which adds to the isolation and suffocating atmosphere. Miller draws you into the characters’ inner souls, exposing their fears and hopes. The end of the book is both harrowing and hopeful. It closes rifts and opens doors. Can true friendship and love win in the end and take you through the dark and difficult times? Coming top is many book clubs ‘must read’ for 2026, this novel certainly blew us away to a world transformed by nature’s icy grip.