Stories release us from the limitations of our ordinary lives. They process the complexities of existence, they entertain, they counsel and console. And sometimes, they save us. I was fourteen and the world was going to end. Four minutes, that was all we’d have, and then we’d be atomised: nothing between us and the bomb except a stupid understairs cupboard or a stupid kitchen table. Every time the Soviet Union and the States went head to head over Afghanistan, say, or Nicaragua, it meant High Wycombe [...]
