It is narrated by 59-year old Edith Harkness, a survivor, who surveys the life-changing pandemic with the benefit of intervening time. I liked its thoughts and ideas, especially those concerning the role of storytelling and artmaking while facing down death. Many scenes felt overwritten and some of the metaphors were over-explained in a way that felt a bit YA. Her mother Naomi I find especially fascinating and the sections where she is in the narrative are the ones I most enjoy. Certainly not because of the portrait of a wayward woman, because the artist Edith portrayed by Hall is quite interesting.

Edith’s mother was a popular novelist before her stroke (and it isn’t until the future scenes that her books will be reassessed as “works of merit”, the “Gothic label stripped off like cheap varnish”; a dismissive term that had been “used for women whose work the establishment enjoys but doesn’t respect” as only “men are the existentialists”.

While lockdown hovered just out of eyeline in Rachel Cusk’s Second Place and provided a coda to Sally Rooney’s Beautiful World, Where Are You, its presence is far from a garnish in Sarah Hall’s new book, a tale of sex and death told by a sculptor, Edith, whose heady liaison with a Turkish restaurateur, Halit, meets a fork in the road with the advent of a deadly virus that liquefies victims from inside. Sarah Hawkins travels, makes art, gets lovers, falls in love, deals with her mother, Rachel (the highlight of the book), and battles against the pandemic. I love the art element, the huge pieces she creates (think scale of the Angel of the North) are visually amazing and are described so well you can see them in your minds eye. From Nobel Laureates Samuel Beckett and Harold Pinter to theatre greats Tom Stoppard and Alan Bennett to rising stars Polly Stenham and Florian Zeller, Faber Drama presents the very best theatre has to offer. First things first, we fight to survive, it might be that we have to fight this fight all alone and yes die alone like so many did and continue to do because of Covid19.

As a storyteller and an artist, Edith struggles to express her experiences and her feelings - and didn't we all during the pandemic?I don’t if you’ve ever read anything by Sarah Hall, but if not, and you were minded to give her a try, then the short stories might be your best bet.

Now Edith is finishing her final piece of work - another monumental piece as a memorial to those who died and will still die - final because the virus is resurfacing in her system and Edith knows she is dying. Similarly, Hall comes up with a work which might challenge some sensibilities, but which is also incredibly moving and ends, albeit without any sentimentality, on a note of cautious hope.

Each collection comprises just a handful of shades, dyed on a variety of yarn bases and is released as I'm reading a book I'm loving.