She is thinking, this narrator, about a baby, her baby. About the black and grey grime that collects from she’s not always entirely sure where under its tiny nails, which are hard to cut given their small size and – not written about, but my assumption – a fear that she might cut and cause to bleed these tiny fingers, causing quite extreme distress for the baby, a baby that has not previously been made aware, if there is even awareness at such a small age, of the inherently precarious construction of our bodies, the meagre matter of us a mis-clip or careless fall away from breach or collapse. She thinks, this narrator, that it would take a very small nail brush to clean this baby’s, her baby’s nails.

I do not have children and do not think I ever will, but, being a man, am able to delay the decision, if it is even a decision, which I’m not sure it is. I could go my entire life without having ridden in a hot air balloon, or without having flown in a hot air balloon, or whatever it is you do with or in a hot air balloon, but to say that, in my lifetime, I decided not to fly or ride in a hot air balloon seems faulty.

It is the nail brush, though, that causes me to put down the book. Who uses nail brushes, these days? Many people, millions around the world still use them, of course, perhaps skewed towards older people, but surely fewer, proportionally, across the ...