The Cinder Path

Thinking himself always the recipient of the dirty end of the stick, Charlie MacFell proceeds toward his true destiny in a story ranging from an early-Edwardian English estate to World War I's western front

BRITAIN'S BEST-LOVED STORYTELLER

Catherine Cookson's novels are about hardship, the intractability of life and of individuals, the struggle first to survive and next to make sense of one's survival. Humour, toughness, resolution and generosity are Cookson virtues, in a world which she often depicts as cold and violent. Her novels are weighted and driven by her own early experiences of illegitimacy and poverty. This is what gives them power. In the specialised world of women's popular fiction, Cookson has created her own territory' - Helen Dunmore, The Times