Theo Cannon, aged 13, drives with his parents to his grandparents’ house in the Welsh Marches. The whole family has been summoned — Theo’s father, Leonard, his three siblings and all their children. The adult siblings are surprised when their mother invites them to put stickers on anything they wish to inherit. The issue of inheritance is a thorny one and Theo does his best to understand the tensions around him. Though the setting is 2008, Theo is writing as a middle-aged man with children of his own, able to see the present as history. Terrific.
Disputed Land by Tim Pears Heinemann, 210pp, £12.99. To buy this book for £10.99 visit thetimes.co.uk/bookshop or call 08452712134