The Winter Guest

Janice is a widow in her 70s. This Christmas, with family elsewhere, she is off to spend Christmas at a friend's hotel in the West of Ireland. She finds herself the only guest, until a man appears, having arrived by boat. They share dinner on Christmas Eve. When she asks him to tell his story he says 'I'd have to kill you if I told you', and Janice, having heard men say things like this before, calls his bluff: they agree to tell each other the worst thing they've ever done.

He, it turns out, committed a huge financial crime at Christmas twenty-five years ago and has been on the run ever since but has come back to see his mother, who lives locally and has been given a terminal diagnosis.

And Janice has a story of her own to tell. But can we trust her? And should this man be so careless with his own story, even if it is Christmas Eve . . .