The Penguin Podcast is back! Listen Now
Quilt on Fire

Quilt on Fire

The Messy Magic of Friends, Sex & Love

Summary

Brought to you by Penguin.

There is something raw in the fault lines, something wilder and more mysterious. There is beauty in the falling apart, a less polished, more honest version of expression.

In her early twenties, Christie Watson was convinced she'd found her soulmate, in a glowing flash of light that turned out to be her tealights setting her quilt on fire. Twenty years later, her bed is burning once again... as she wakes in a perimenopausal sweat, night after night.

This is the story of her journey through mid-life: of the joy of letting go and the pain of the morning after, of the unstoppable power of female friendship and the struggle to raise teenagers as a single parent. It lays bare the exhilaration, agony, wonder and fears of being a middle-aged woman with a wild heart, a changing body and a new set of challenges. And as her world takes on a different shape, there's something else she starts to feel: the hot flush of possibility.

'I adore Christie Watson. Quilt on Fire is full of her trademark candour, compassion and humour. A wildly entertaining - and necessary book' ELIZABETH DAY

© Christie Watson 2022 (P) Penguin Audio 2022

Reviews

  • Literary, gritty, joyful and very, very funny, reading Quilt on Fire is like hanging out with a best friend, one who knows you so well that she can see inside your soul... Virgina Woolf-sharp
    Stacey Duguid, Sunday Telegraph

About the author

Christie Watson

Christie Watson is Professor of Medical Humanities at UEA and worked as an NHS nurse for over twenty years. She has written seven books, including her first novel Tiny Sunbirds Far Away, which won the Costa First Novel Award, and memoir, The Language of Kindness which was a number one Sunday Times bestseller. Christie is a contributor to The Times, Sunday Times, Guardian, Daily Telegraph and TEDx, and her work has been translated into 23 languages and adapted for theatre.
Learn More

More from this Author

Sign up to the Penguin Newsletter

For the latest books, recommendations, author interviews and more