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Dancing housewives, they are every where. Once they went out to dance. Now they dance in their houses, unseen and unnoticed. This is their story, or at least three of their stories as there are many more that could be told. "Dancing Housewives" is about women’s spirit and why the dancing can never stop.

This is the first in a set of three books about a Close in Peterborough in 1995. The story follows three women, Kim recently separated from her husband who has left her for her for a lycra clad fitness instructor, Mavis, a sweet little old lady who isn’t all that she appears, and Natalya, a Russian internet bride who watches the close from her window and hides her sadness behind net curtains.

Kim battles with a particularly nasty neighbour, family therapy, a smug mother, her younger son’s ADHD, her older son’s precociousness, her estranged ex and most importantly the onset of flabby upper arms.

Mavis, a solitary and private person, contrary to her nature becomes increasingly intrigued by her two younger neighbours. Determined not to end up going to the old folks’ day centre and, perish the thought, learn to knit and take part in reminiscence therapy, finds her life becoming inextricably linked with them.

Natalya, married to the unremarkable Colin, longs for a baby after her daughter, born prematurely, lived for only a few days. But her longings are unfulfilled and she sits day after day at the window, withdrawing further and further away from the world. She too watches Kim and finds that for the first in a very long time, that she starts to take an interest in events outside her own four walls.

Events are spurred on from an unlikely quarter. Mr Jackson, another resident of the Close, who spends his life producing topiary of the royal family and hating the world in general and especially women, starts a chain of events that brings the three women together. From Kim’s initial encounter with him she can’t seem to resist returning to the scene of the crime time and again.

On her third attempt to make some sense of the man she downs a some whisky, just a glass of course for Dutch courage, although inexplicably the bottle has gone down by over a quarter, thinks her two children are safely with their father and the she bitch cow from hell and sets out to confront Mr Jackson once and for all. So spurred on by a re-run of High Noon she proceeds to call him out, western style, with surprising consequences for all concerned. Events are watched by the two women who run the corner shop and a small but involved crowd.

Also arriving on the scene are Mavis and Natalya who pick her up and take her indoors with of course the family in tow. The family leave and the three women remain, uncertain of each other at first. Mavis then suggests the hair of the dog for Kim and indeed all of them. This is the first of many times in a kitchen sharing dreams and memories.

From this beginning they begin to form a friendship that will surprise them all and secure a bond that is sturdy and strong.

As they spend more and more time together, Kim and Natalya discover that there is far more to Mavis than meets the eye as they spend whisky filled afternoons, reliving the past and sharing dreams for the future. With laughter and a few tears, from a time of uncertainty and loneliness the women discover how the events of the past can shape the future. All have their own stories to tell, from their perspectives in time, women, their lives shaped by their place in history, all are changed by their friendship with one another.

Natalya, desperate for her own children, offers to look after Kim’s and in doing so starts to find a purpose in her days. The story follows her as she gradually sees a future. It is not ideal and it is not exactly what she wanted, but caring for Kim’s children gives her a new perspective on life. None the less she is still waiting for her baby, but her days of waiting by the window are over and her life begins again.

Mavis continues to surprise and has some deep and dark secrets which she eventually feels ready to share with her friends and that will shock them to the core. There is something sinister lurking under the stair, something wicked in the skirting board, something dark in the cupboard.

The story follows their ups and downs. After her debacle in the Close family therapy is suggested for Kim, with dire consequences.

We meet Sylvia and Joyce, who run the corner shop and tell outrageous lies about everyone that they meet. Gloria Carpet, Kim’s hapless Social Worker who finds that her life will never be the same after meeting Kim.

What nobody realises, least of all Kim, is that she is about to weave her magic over the Close. The truth of the matter is, that no one’s life will remain the same after the women come together and that everyone they touch will find that their lives are transformed in some way.

The story listens to the women as they talk, as only women can do. The minutiae of life is examined at close quarters. We share their memories, their days, their struggles as they try to find rhyme and reason in the daily grind.

Kim, Mavis and Natalya share their lives, brought together by proximity. Their spirit is undiminished and they find that they can still hear the music, despite the adversity that life brings, they are still the Dancing Wives, jagged and vibrant, bold and brash. Ready for anything life can throw at them, bring it on, bring it, bring it on, before the orchestra’s fled, before they’re asked to pay the bill, they turn to each other, ‘Come on girls, Lets face the music and dance.’