The inscription inside says: "To Dad, who won't read this. Love E." He didn't. Ninety pence.

Sue Ryder in Whitstable, wet Tuesday in October, bottom shelf, ten pence off for a soft corner.

Things that came with it: a train ticket from Faversham dated 2018, used as a bookmark and abandoned at page 112; a coffee ring on the back cover that has soaked through to about chapter three; and the inscription, which I've thought about more than I've thought about most novels this year. To Dad, who won't read this. Love E. The spine isn't cracked anywhere past that train ticket, so E was right about her father, and I have been quietly furious with a man I've never met since roughly November.

The cover is one of the blue and gold ones with the frost patterns, which is honestly why I picked it up, and I've since seen the other editions and they're worse, so: correct decision, no notes on my own behaviour there.

The actual book, briefly, because it deserves a sentence. Cold, and I mean that as praise — you can feel the stove and the dark pressing on the other side of the wall. Vasya is wonderful. It sags a bit when everyone's arguing about the priest. But what I'll actually remember is that it's the only thing on my shelves that arrived with a stranger's disappointment tucked inside the cover.

It's staying. Obviously it's staying, the flat is full and it's staying.