In brief: It was the wheelchair ramp that gave away the purpose of The Albany; an imposing and substantial house in its own leafy grounds, but an old people’s home nonetheless. Although the gold-coloured rails alongside the ramp did speak of a higher-class way of coping with ageing.

Eloise was getting that slightly hysterical positivity usually associated with daytime television, and Joan, her mother, was keen that she didn’t feel guilty about the selection of her new home. This place was certainly better than the last one they’d looked at; a bit high Victorian, but certainly well presented. Sister Karen, who greeted them, had an air of repressive authority about her, Joan thought, but was all efficient professionalism. Eloise’s job was so busy that Joan didn’t want to take up more of her time than was necessary, and, to her delight, the pedals were back.

The floating piano pedals, which opened a world of delight for Joan, hovered nearby, and she so wanted to be alone to enjoy the transportation they offered. As she vaguely listened to her daughter questioning Sister Karen, she began to think how like Sister Karen was to her mother-in-law Astrid.

As they left The Albany Eloise’s phone rang. It was Claude, and of course once he knew she was with Joan he wanted to talk to her. When Claude and Eloise had been together Joan had got on with him almost better than with Eloise. And Eloise knew that once the call had ended, Joan would not be long in recalling the wonderful meals the two of them had made together – Eloise knew how much Joan would have loved Claude as a son-in-law. Claude was a scientist whose life’s work was to make osmium of practical use. As a commodities dealer Eloise didn’t need to know the ins and outs of it, but she did know a good thing when she heard it. As soon as Claude used the phrase ‘home straight’, Eloise knew that she would expose her fund to ever more osmium. When Claude made his triumphant announcement, her fund would make a killing. She imagined the look on her boss Patrick’s face – almost as good would be the look on her rival Carol’s.

Eloise felt that The Albany was the best they’d seen – the best they were likely to see – and Joan agreed that it did seem excellent. Once Eloise started talking about waiting lists, and putting Joan’s name down, Joan became keener. The longer she had to wait, the longer she could stay where she was. And there was the Trip of a Lifetime coming up.

Eloise had it all planned out. She was taking her mother on a Trip of a Lifetime to revisit the South Africa of her youth before she moved into her new home in The Albany. The staggering cost of her mother’s new home could only be met by a substantial bonus – a bonus that would be paid when osmium found its place in the sun. The bonus that would now be nicely upped, as Eloise had fought for a further 65-million-dollar investment. As Eloise packed for the trip, she looked forward to her triumph.

The trip goes well until a panicked call from Eloise’s boss brings her crashing down to earth, and she’s forced to leave her mother and her credit card in South Africa, where Joan explores her family’s history in the Boer War. On her return, Joan enters The Albany and a world that merges her family history and the history of the home. A visit to the library brings her an ally as well as further knowledge of the past, although the worlds of past and present begin to blur. But her daughter Eloise’s world is gradually imploding, and the one thing she really needs, an ally, proves horribly elusive.

About the author

Richard Mason was born in South Africa in 1978 to activist parents who settled in England when he was ten. Brought up and educated here, he wrote his first novel, The Drowning People, whilst a nineteen-year-old at Oxford. In the intervening years, Richard finished his degree, then set up an educational charity in memory of his sister Kay, who died as a child. Under Desmond Tutu’s patronage, the Kay Mason Foundation provides scholarships to disadvantaged South African children, paying for them to attend some of the country’s best schools.

For discussion

• ‘Argument always had the capacity to crystallise the uncertain for Eloise, to lend opinion the quality of truth.’ Is this the root of Eloise’s problems?
• Why is Trip of a Lifetime capitalised?
• ‘What the teenage Eloise did not understand is that even the social credibility of a back-row bus seat must fade.’ Does it have to?
• ‘The friendliness of the black servers astonished Eloise, who could not understand why the luxury they serviced did not provoke a murderous bloodlust in them.’ Would their attitude surprise you? What does this tell us about Eloise?
• What does the author think about globalisation?

Suggested further reading:

Commando: A Boer Journal of the Boer War by Deneys Reitz
The Blackwater Lightship by Colm Tóibín
That Bloody Woman: A Biography of Emily Hobhouse by John Hall
Hideous Kinky by Esther Freud
The Boer War by Thomas Pakenham
The Yellow Wallpaper by Charlotte Perkins Gilman