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Today, a programme about watching and observing. In Mary Lawson's new novel, a young girl watches from a window for a sister who might never return. In our reading recommendation, a reclusive man peers through holes

in a plywood wall, and we widen our rather voyeuristic focus to discover how writers watch their

characters. We start with Canadian novelist Mary Lawson, whose new novel, a town called Solis,

is set in a fictional rural community in

Northern Ontario. The book is centred around three main characters, seven-year-old Clara, whose

older sister has run away, Liam, who arrives in Solis after the breakdown of his marriage,

and Elizabeth Orchard, Clara's elderly neighbour, who has been taken ill. As Liam moves into her

empty house, Mrs. Orchard remembers a troubled past from her hospital bed, and we gradually find out

what connects her to Liam, as well as what might have happened to Clara's sister. All of this

set against a backdrop of a friendly, albeit somewhat nosy, local community.

It is Lawson's fourth novel. Her first Crow Lake was published in 2002 and became a

bestseller. She followed up with the other side of the bridge, which was long listed for the

Booker Prize, and Road Ends, all of which were, like her latest,

set in fictional towns in her native Canada. And Mary Lawson is on the line with me now,

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