Francesca Stubbs holds our hand as we take a walk through old age and death. Fran brings us to drinks with her friends, dropping off suppers for her ex-husband, warm and cosy in his infirmity. She visits her daughter, holed up as the waters rise in a sodden West Country, and texts her son in Lanzarote, as he deals with the estate of his deceased girlfriend.

The questions of what constitutes a good death preoccupy this glittering novel. The Dark Flood Rises asks momentous questions as it entertains and enthralls. In her beautifully imagined new novel, Margaret Drabble is at her incisive best, exploring the end of life with her trademark humour, composure and wisdom.