High in the Canadian Arctic, British art historian Jenny pursues her passions: Inuit art and a handsome geologist. But the sudden news that her mother has suffered a stroke reels Jenny back to her old life - the responsible youngest daughter of parents who gave up everything to join a religious cult. In Inverness, Jenny tries to put the jumbled pieces together, while turning to her collection of "worry stones" for comfort. Did her mother escape from the cult? Is her father, a prominent cult leader, threatening to take her back? Can Jenny persuade her sisters to set aside old grievances to save their mother? Amidst the turmoil, Jenny tries to breaks free of the childhood pressures that stifled her creative talents and emerge as an artist in her own right.

The Fleece Era is Yukon-based, UK-born Joanna Lilley's first book of poems: a wry and eloquent testament to the intricacies of our various relationships. From the shattered pieces of our environmental puzzles to the labyrinth of family dynamics, Lilley makes these dilemmas come alive. Chillingly sparse, attractively odd and refreshingly frank, The Fleece Era embraces the complexities of human life with an unsettling mix of the sardonic and the compassionate.