Dusty grows up caring for her family, and, once she is old enough to organize her own affairs, she takes great care to move out of her parents’ home. Soon, Dusty is able to accomplish a great deal: she works long hours and is made senior partner at her firm, she keeps her own flat, and she falls hopelessly and irresponsibly in love with a married man. But, when her father telephones to report some disturbing news, Dusty must return home for the winter. There, heartbroken but still dutiful, Dusty finally reunites with her oldest friends.         First published in the US as part of her encouraging book of missives to aspiring writers, The Maeve Binchy Writers’ Club, “Dusty’s Winter” is essential Maeve. Inspiring and down-to-earth, her stories are full of the stuff of everyday life. Ireland’s “best-loved writer of her generation,” Maeve Binchy often wrote about ordinary life in small-town Ireland, and she is fondly remembered for the warmth and generosity of her prose.   Maeve Binchy has received a Lifetime Achievement Award at the British Book Awards in 1999 and the Irish PEN/A.T. Cross Award in 2007 and is the author of many bestselling books including Maeve’s Times, Chestnut Street, and A Week in Winter.   An eBook short.