My name is Jude. Because of Law, Hey and the Obscure, they thought I was a boy.
So begins the story of the magical summer Jude spent on the island of Sark (near Guernsey) when she was 21.
The ‘they’ referred to are the wealthy parents of sixteen year old Pip who hire Jude to live on the island and teach their son. Jude is a graduate but a ridiculous choice to teach the superbrainy Pip anything. Not that it ends up mattering. On her first day Jude meets and is mesmerised by another hired hand, Sofi, from “Poland via Ealing”. Sofi is edgy, beautiful, nineteen. She’s a reasonably good cook but also a breaker of rules and a resentful noticer of the many slights and put-downs inflicted upon her, a working-class girl, by this tiny and class-conscious society. Jude spends most of her time studying Sofi. Pip watches them both. Continue reading
