Lillian & Gillian: A Tale of Propitious Peregrinations

Lillian Selby is a librarian. She works at the Manchester Central Library. She lives alone in a small maisonnette in Rusholme, which has been her home since she was an undergraduate at university. Her life is quiet, ordered, mostly solitary, quite mundane.

Gillian Lewis is another personality entirely, albeit she and Lillian do have much in common.

But back to Lillian. Since almost forever, she has been pretty much completely sedentary and now feels the need finally to travel, having put by a little nest egg, and being at a moment in her life where, as they say, a change might be as good as a rest. It is not, as Lillian finds herself having to fill the utterly unfamiliar shoes of Gillian, facing hostile environments at every turn. Well, to be fair, some good things happen too, you know, like friendship, and even love.

As Tom Lehrer famously wrote in his 1951 song Lobachevsky: “Who deserves the credit? And who deserves the blame?” In this instance, it is Propitious Peregrinations ® that must, in Lillian’s view, assume full responsibility. This account of her (mis)adventures is her effort to warn all who may be tempted to follow in her own faltering footsteps. Beware!