Evie, Nic and Becca are wannabe writers. The three friends are members of a creative writing group and they decide to enter a national competition. But while they ponder their plots and agonise about their characters, their own lives are going far from smoothly.

Evie's still pining for the husband who left her for a younger woman and is relying increasingly on clairvoyant Zelda. But who is Zelda really?

Nic's battling a drink problem and is in despair about her workaholic husband who is addicted to his laptop. A shocking discovery shakes her to the core, but will she realise in time that she must stop protecting him?

Becca's a City highflyer who seems to have everything - until a childhood friend turns up, threatening to expose the secret she's kept buried for nearly thirty years. How will her marriage, her children, her friendships survive it? And on top of that there's a deadline. The women have just eleven months to complete their manuscripts. Who will win the competition - and can there be any real-life happy endings?

Emma Burstall is a freelance writer who works mainly for theGuardian,Independent on Sundayand women's magazines, includingWoman and HomeandWoman. Educated at St Paul's Girls' School and Cambridge University, where she read English, Emma lives in south-west London with her husband, Kevin Maguire, the award-winning political columnist and broadcaster and associate editor of theDaily Mirror. They have three children.

The second novel by the author of Gym and Slimline takes the interwoven stories of three friends who decide to enter a writing competition, with quite unforeseen consequences.