With A Little Help From My Friends

Nov 5, 2025 4:26 AM

Author:Patricia Burns

They were the talented ones - young, fresh, arrogant, with a bright golden world swinging ahead of them. Then came that terrible, traumatic summer, their last summer together, the summer that had savagely thrust them into the adult world.

Jill - the leader, brilliant, ambitious. She made it to the top but never recovered from that nightmare summer.

Carol - lovely, languid, destined to be a great artist until her own sexuality destroyed her dreams.

Penny - determined to drag herself from a council estate and a scrounging father to the glittering world of the stage.

Andrea - loyal, obedient, self-effacing - and dazzled to be part of the clever set. She never realized her life was a lie.

They never really knew the truth about that summer - just that it had changed their lives.

Reviews

The era and the seaside locale are beautifully rendered and observed, not least the social and sexual undercurrents of the time

—— Elizabeth Buchan , Sunday Times

A humane and evocative portrait of a time when lives were destroyed by intolerance

—— Guardian

This spiky portrait of love makes for a gripping read

—— Independent

Pitch perfect

—— Marie Claire

A moving story of longing and frustration

—— Observer

Stunning...fraught and honest

—— New York Times Book Review

'I loved it. Devoured it! A wonderful read. Tense, romantic, smart; a beautiful portrait of a seaside town poised at an exact moment in history, with people trapped by laws and mores'

—— Russell T. Davies (on Instagram)

A powerful story of love, shame and jealousy

—— Mohsin Zaidi

Roberts gives us two strong, absorbing voices, whose competing claims on our sympathies...make My Policeman a satisfyingly taut and involving read

—— Times Literary Supplement

A powerful story of forbidden love, regret, and living as your true self

—— Vanity Fair

A gripping read

—— Viv Groskop , Red

A sensitive, sweeping novel

—— Vogue

Captures the obsessive and destructive madness of sexual jealousy

—— Psychologies

Roberts deploys her research carefully, honing a novel with a strong period feel and a sprightly structure

—— Independent

An amazing read

—— Latest 7

Roberts’ sharp, evocative prose renders this simple story complex, enthralling and compelling

—— Anne Hill , Sussex Life

This spiky portrait of love makes for a gripping read

—— Emma Hagestadt , Independent Radar

A heartbreaking examination of lives and love

—— Diva Magazine

A powerful story of sexual jealousy and longing, My Policeman is also a heartbreaking examination of lives and love that has gone to waste in an era in which homosexuality was a prosecutable offence

—— DIVA Magazine

A delicious novel by an experienced author who captures the scientific atmosphere of the early 19th century with a devastating study of infidelity

—— Colin Gardiner , Oxford Times

The real life players of the Napoleonic era spring to life

—— i

Compelling

—— Big Issue

Highly assured and almost educational with its broad sweep of history

—— Jane Housham , Guardian

Tillyard’s achievement is in this original portray log the Regency era and its relevance to our own time

—— Philippa Williams , The Lady

a very human tale about passion, secrets and lies.

—— Reading Matters

An achingly brilliant piece of writing on passion and delusion. It's a pleasure to read from start to finish and reignites our love for fiction

—— Independent

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