The Expectation of Silence

Andy is a small-time fence, endearing himself to precisely noone except his mother, who continually tries to win him over with affection, and his best friend from school, who believes that if he can come out of prison a better man then so can Andy. He lives alone in the London suburbs, being dire to his mother and diverting into different branches of crime. He begins to experience so many mishaps that he becomes insomniac and takes to valium. The story interweaves with scenes from the late forties and early fifties, where his grandmother struggles to cope with post-war austerity and bringing up two small girls. One Advent night, she takes her own life. Kitty, her elder daughter, and Andy's mother, grew up believing herself responsible. Only once he appears in court for the first time does he realise that all the accidents didn't happen by chance and that something he thought he had pushed aside could not leave him. Advent turns into a time of healing for people who had never imagined that they could be free.