A Tapestry of True Tales from Then and Now This collection of nine short stories comes from historical novelist Clare Flynn. There are five historical tales - four based on stories from her own family history, and a tragic tale from eighteenth century Sussex. A Fine Pair of Shoes started out with her wish to capture and embroider the bare bones of a family story, based on her paternal great-great-grandparents and their trip to The Great Exhibition of 1851. The Proposal is based on the tragic death of Flynn's maternal grandfather, killed on the Liverpool docks in 1934 when my mother was six. The collection also includes contemporary fiction with four intriguing stories - modern morality tales, set in England, Paris, the USA and an island in the Indian Ocean. Beautifully crafted, vividly brought to life on the page these quirky stories give an insight into human nature at its best - and its worst.