Write the book.Build only what it asks for.

The letters came on the Thursday boat, three of them, tied with the grey string her mother had always used. Ada did not open them at the harbour. She carried them up the hill the way one carries something that might still be warm.

By the time she reached the house the wind had turned. She set the letters on the table beside the lamp and left them there while she made tea, as if the ordinary tasks could be made to go first.

The first was dated in March, which meant it had waited somewhere for the better part of a season. She read it standing, and then again sitting down, and the second reading was the one that counted.

Outside, the ferry gave its long note and turned for the mainland,