One Good Thing

Meet Olivia (Liv): forty-five-years-old and recently divorced after her husband left her for a younger woman.

Meet Harry: an old rescue dog who was dumped on the moors when he was too old to hunt and replaced with a young dog.

After her divorce, Liv moves from London to a sleepy village in Yorkshire to start again. To where she spent happy childhood holidays with her big sister Josie. Determined to forget her failed marriage she buys a 200-year-old cottage to renovate and tries to build a new home and life for herself. But it's not as easy as in all those self-help books, and feeling lost and lonely she decides to go to the local rescue shelter to adopt a puppy.

However, just as she's about to sign the adoption papers she sees an old dog; maybe she's projecting, but she's never seen a dog look so despairing and it strikes a chord. When the woman at the rescue charity tells her ?he just needs something good to happen' Liv feels as if she's talking about herself. She decides to adopt him and calls him Harry.

Harry suffers with arthritis and is almost lame, so Liv takes him for a short walks around the neighbourhood by houses where Valentine, an old man who suffers from loneliness, sits by the window and Stanley, who has autism and is scared of everyone, hides behind the garden gate. To the local cafe where she tutors Maya, a teenager who is angry with everyone and everything. But slowly Harry starts to change things . . .

This is a book about friendships, about hope, about love and loyalty, and about how one man's rubbish is another man's treasure. It's about a woman and a dog, and how a dog can bring a whole community together. He heals Liv's heart, keeps Valentine company and helps Stanley find his laughter and his courage. And ultimately inspires an act of heroism that not only saves Maya's life, but gives Liv her life back.