The Night in Question by Susan Fletcher

Tragedy strikes at Babbington Hall, where octogenarian wheelchair user Florence Butterfield has lived since a freak accident caused her to lose her left leg. Death is familiar in the warden-assisted group of dwellings, but it usually takes place peacefully, and indoors. When a comparative youngster in his mid-seventies falls in the garden, hits his head and dies, it is the violence of his passing which distresses Florrie. Afterwards other disturbing incidents take place, leading up to a second tragedy. Florrie is sure this one is no accident. While she struggles to uncover the truth, caring Florrie never loses her courage. She knows that ‘love, the proper, deep, extraordinary kind – is not about you’. The Night in Question is the story of Florrie’s life, and how she is living it.     

Florrie is an intelligent, passionate woman who has known love and loss all over the world. She has experienced - among other things - swimming with turtles, sexual tension with an emerald prospector in Africa, and a sixty-seven year friendship which began with a broken pencil. The only door into her past which she is afraid to open is the one which leads to ‘the Hackney incident’. She bears the scars of this trauma in more ways than one. By solving the mystery enclosed in a discarded magenta envelope, she learns to accept what happened to her, and comes to terms with its implications.

Susan Fletcher’s lyrical prose carries the reader along in a stream of engaging detail and striking anecdote. The residents of Babbington Hall are an interesting bunch with entertaining quirks. The Night in Question was written to show that old people matter, and this target has been achieved one hundred times over.

I was given a copy of this book in return for an honest review.