Carry me, son. Do not leave me behind. Are you listening to me?

Of course you’re listening, you say, and add the F-word. Off you go to cope with a storm. Lucerne armfuls for horses. For cows, rye-spindly hay.

Alone in the paddocks of his grass hotel a man tends to his beloved horses, Sock and Boy. The voice of his mother-accusatory, fragmenting from dementia-haunts his every move, an excoriating reminder of his failures in the world of people.

The Grass Hotel is a story of damage and repair, of familial obligation and the resentments it can cause. It is also about the profound comfort that a connection with animals can offer.

With its extraordinary use of language, Craig Sherborne’s novel is by turns savage and tender, raw and poetic: a small masterpiece.