A Kind of Intimacy

Jenn Ashworth

From Shelf: All Time Favourites.

The prize-winning debut by Jenn Ashworth, which led her to be picked as one of the 12 Best New British Novelists by BBC TV's The Culture Show in 2011, a blackly funny and compelling tale of obsession, misplaced passion and one seriously mixed-up young woman - the kind of neighbour you would not wish on your worst enemy.

Annie is obese, lonely and hopeful. Armed with self-help books, her cat and a collection of cow-shaped milk jugs, she moves into her new home and sets about getting to know the neighbours, especially the man next door. She ignores her neighbour's inconvenient girlfriend, but it's not quite as easy for Annie to dismiss her own past. As Annie's murky history of violence, secrets and sexual mishaps catches up with her, she cannot see that she has done anything wrong. She's just doing what any good neighbour would do, after all...