The Roundabout Man by Clare Morrall

Quinn Smith is approaching old age and is in retreat from his past. His mother was a children's author, as famous as as Shirley Hughes, AA Milne, Arthur Ransome and Enid Blyton, and he and his triplets are the infamous stars of her books. But real life growing up in Quinn's family was very different, as bereft of love as rich in priveledge and he has grown old without growing up, fixed like a fly in amber at the age of 5 in the pages of his mother's books. As The Roundabout Man opens Quinn is living in anonimity in a caravan on a motorway roundabout, hidden away in the trees that remain of Primrose Valley and existing by scavenging from the service station of the same name. But his peace is disturbed when he is approached by a young ambitious journalist unaware of his past, who breaks his solitude. As tragedy strikes he is forced into contact and engagement with the staff of Primrose Valley service station and begins at last to question his past and separate the fiction of his mother's books from the reality of a painful upbringing. Delicately asking the question as to what happens to those like Christopher Robin who have fame thrust upon them by others.