Excerpt from Loved and Missed by Susie Boyt, plus links to reviews, author biography & more

He thanked me for coming. 'You've got your hands full, I imagine. Can't be easy.'

'Well... ' Luckily Lily beamed at that exact moment in my arms and she was very contagious and I said to the priest, 'Of course she makes it easy.'

He nodded. 'She looks to have a very good nature.'

Outside the church some ragged clumps of marigolds grew in grey slatted wooden tubs dotted with cigarette butts and scraps of confetti. A street sweeper was rounding up piles of withered leaves. 'Shall we?' the priest took my arm, supporting the point of my elbow with his fingertips. Was he this courtly with all his people? I quite liked being treated like the mother of the bride. We all went into the church, took our seats at the front, first three rows of stark brown pews were fullish, perhaps thirty of us altogether. there was a strong odour of incense mixed with wax polish and disinfectant; a wave of artificial vanilla from my neighbour's violent scent. Someone put a tape on– 'God only knows what I'd be without you'. I sat down with Lily propped up on my lap, my arm firm across her warm middle, jiggling my knee up and down rhythmically. An older woman passed us a fine white shawl edged in satin. She was something to do with the church possibly. I thanked her, sniffed it discreetly; it smelled only of wool and soap flakes and although it wasn't new, it was lightly matted, it looked clean, so I gathered it into a little dress shape over Lily's Babygro – it was cool in the church – and she began cuddling it so that was good. I patted the envelope of money– paper armour against my heart– and felt the swell of anxious calculations. You need to get your courage up, I mouthed the words. Concentrate.

Lily was light in my arms, too light possibly, for seven months; the heaviest thing about her was her nappy. I nipped up the back of the church and used a pew as a changing table, laid out a folding mat on some kneelers with basic tapestry of London landmarks: the Post Offce Tower, Big Ben, Marble Arch. When I finished I splashed a few drops of holy water on her belly button for a sort of joke. I wasn't religious any more. I didn't suppose Lily was. Eleanor certainly wasn't. Lily chuckled as I sprinkled her. She wore a good, strong, past-caring look as I did up the silver poppers on her suit. Her facial expressions sometimes reminded me of an elderly Jewish comedian. I winked at her. She very nearly returned the gesture.

I had to be quite stoic when I was with Eleanor– if I looked in any way aggrieved, she would not speak– but I forgot in my panic that seeing me spritz myself all over with false brightness disgusted her a little bit also. I was not in love with it myself. She hated anything resembling dishonesty or performance, but if I faced her truthfully she would probably never see me again. What did she think courage was? She could be so exacting; but it was a day for generosity, or if not generosity then painstaking kindness, and if I couldn't run to that then a hazy sort of last-ditch myopic indulgence. I despised these sorts of downwards adjustments which made me feel miserly. An uncouth relation in a Jane Austen. Something like that, anyway.

It was five to twelve. the tentative rain was gathering strength, chipping against the high windows, thickening the congregation. A man about my age, mid fifties, settled himself in front of me, propping up a young red-haired woman whose eyes kept closing. Every now and then he prodded her affectionately in the ribs with his elbow or his rolled-up Standard and she'd come to and smile and switch herself on for a minute brightly and giggle and seem to be winning at things, and then she would soften herself, her shoulders and her features would sag and dim and she'd slump forward again, as though a fascinating scene was playing out in her lap. It wasn't dramatic, all very light and soft and casual, these small *ashes of animation, but her red hair was wild against the man's sharp navy blazer, some of her corkscrew curls like telephone cable coming out of her head at right angles. Her freckles had a life of their own.

Excerpted from Loved and Missed by Susie Boyt. Copyright © 2023 by Susie Boyt. Excerpted by permission of New York Review Books. All rights reserved. No part of this excerpt may be reproduced or reprinted without permission in writing from the publisher.