Smaller

Carmel Morgan’s Smaller follows Bernice Clulow, whose selfless devotion to her disabled mother is legendary. Yet every evening she heads home, the smile becomes fixed: Mum will want to talk. She demands despatches from the human race, but Bernice just wants to kick her shoes off (And her Mum’s head in). Missing out on those precious mother-daughter moments, Cath Clulow wisely flew the best straight from school. Now belting out karaoke classics to vomiting, rollocking hen parties in Puerto Banus, she wonders how a promising career in musical theatre has gone so horribly off-key. House-bound, honour-bound and homeward-bound, the Clulows pick their way through a minefield of guilt,resentment and fear.