- Following on from ‘A Change in Climate’, this brilliant novel follows two girls as they leave behind their pasts and set off to the new preoccupations of 1970s London.It is London, 1970. Carmel McBain, in her first term at university, has cut free of her childhood roots in the north. Among the gossiping, flirtatious girls of Tonbridge Hall, she begins her experiments in life and love. But the year turns. The mini-skirt falls out of style and an era of concealment begins. Carmel’s world darkens, and tragedy waits in the wings.