Excerpt from Strawberry Fields (Two Caravans) by Marina Lewycka, plus links to reviews, author biography & more

"I am not old," protests Tomasz.

In fact he has just turned forty-five. On his birthday he looked in the mirror and found two more gray hairs on his head, which he pulled out at once. No wonder his hair is beginning to look thin. Soon he will have to surrender to the grayness, to cut his hair short, put away his guitar, exchange his dreams for compromises, and start worrying about his pension. What has happened to his life? It is just slipping away, like sand through an hourglass, like a mountain washed to the sea.

"Tell me, Vitaly, how has life turned you into a cynic at such a young age?"

Vitaly shrugs. "Maybe I was not born to be a loser, like you, Tomek."

"Maybe there is still time enough for you."

How can he explain to this impatient young man what it has taken him forty-five years to learn - that loss is an essential part of the human condition. That even as we are moving on down that long lonesome road, destination unknown, there is always something we are leaving behind. He has been trying all morning to compose a song about it.

Putting down the binoculars, he reaches for his guitar and begins to strum, tapping his feet in time to the rhythm.

There once was a man, who roamed the world o’er.

Was he seeking for riches, or glory, or power?

Was he seeking for meaning, or truth or . . .

This is where he gets stuck. What else is that wretched man seeking?

Vitaly gives him a pitying look.

"Obviously he is looking for someone to fuck."

He picks up the binoculars, turns the knob to focus, and gives a soft whistle between his teeth.

"Hey, black man," he calls to Emanuel in English, "come and see. Look, it’s just like the little panties that Jordan is wearing in my poster. Or maybe . . ." - he adjusts the binoculars again - ". . . maybe it is one of those string nets they use to package salami."

Emanuel is sitting at the table, chewing a pencil for inspiration as he composes a letter.

"Leave him, leave him," says Tomasz. "Emanuel is not like you. He is . . ." He strums a couple of chords on his guitar as he searches for the right phrase. "In this box of fiberglass, he is searching for a gem."

"Another loser," snorts Vitaly.

Dear Sister

Thank you for the money you sent for with its help I have now journeyed from Zomba to Lilongwe and so on via Nairobi into England. I hope these words will receive you for when I came to the address you gave in London a dinerent name was written at the door and nobody knew of your wherebeing. So being needful of money I came into the way of strawberry picking and I am staying in a trailer with three mzungus here in Kent. I am striving with all my might to improve my English but this English tongue is like a coilsome and slippery serpent and I am always trying to remember the lessons of Sister Benedicta and her harsh stan of chastisement. So I write hopefully that you will come there and find these letters and unleash your corrections upon them dear sister. And so I will inform you regulally of my adventures within this rainstruck land.

From your beloving brother Emanuel!

The women’s trailer is already in sunshine, but the sun hasn’t yet reached the bottom of the field, where Andriy is standing at the kitchen end of the men’s trailer trying to light the gas to make some tea. The coarse banter from the sleeping room irritates him, and he doesn’t want the other three to notice the agitation that has come over him since yesterday. He lights another match. It flares and burns his fingers before the gas will catch. Devil’s bum! That girl, that new Ukrainian girl - when their eyes met, did she smile at him in a particular way?

He replays the scene like a movie in his head. It is this time yesterday. Farmer Leapish arrives as usual in his Land Rover with the breakfast food, the trays of empty boxes for the strawberries, and the key to the prefab. Then someone steps out of the passenger door of the Land Rover, a pretty girl with a long plait of dark hair down her back, and brown eyes full of sparkle. And that smile. She steps into the field, looking around this way and that. He is there standing by the gate, and she turns his way and smiles. But is it for him, that smile? That’s what he wants to know.

Excerpted from Strawberry Fields by Marina Lewycka Copyright © 2007 by Marina Lewycka. Excerpted by permission of Penguin Group USA, Inc. All rights reserved. No part of this excerpt may be reproduced or reprinted without permission in writing from the publisher.