We are looking for a summer-season cook for our busy seaside café. The job will also involve taking orders and waiting on tables. The successful applicant will be naturally friendly, be able to boil an egg, enjoy a chat and have a well-developed sense of empathy with other human beings. Good sense of humour absolutely vital. The only experience required is experience of life, along with decent cooking skills. Pay is pitiful, but the position comes with six weeks’ free use of a luxury holiday cottage in a family-friendly setting near the Jurassic Coast, with use of a swimming pool, games room and playground. Children, dogs, cats, guinea pigs and stray maiden aunts all welcome. No application form needed – if you’re interested, send us your heart and soul in letter form, telling us why you think you’re right for the job. Post your essays to Cherie Moon, The Comfort Food Café, Willington Hill, near Budbury, Dorset.

Chapter 2

Dear Cherie,

I’m writing to you about the job you advertised for a cook at the Comfort Food Café in Dorset.

This is about my sixth attempt at composing this letter, and all the rest have ended up as soggy, crumpled balls lying on the floor around the bin – my aim seems to be as off as my writing skills. I’ve promised myself that this time, no matter how long it gets, or how many mistakes I might make, this will be the final version. From the heart, like you asked for, even if it takes me the rest of the day. If nothing else it’s pretty good therapy.

This is probably not the most professional or brilliant way to make a first impression, and you’re most likely thinking about filing this under ‘N for nutter’ – or possibly ‘B for bin’. I can only apologise – my hand’s a bit cramped now and I have a blister coming up on my ring finger. I haven’t written this much since my A levels, so please forgive me if it gets a bit messy.

To be honest, everything in my life is a bit messy. It got that way just over two years ago, when my husband, David, died. He was the same age as me – I’m thirty-five now – and he was the love of my life. I can’t give you a romantic story about how we met at a wedding or got set up on a blind date by friends, or how our eyes met across a crowded nightclub – mainly because our eyes actually met across a crowded playground when we were seven years old.

He’d joined our school a few years in and appeared like a space alien at the start

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