This is a wry collection of short stories, mostly about a stressed-out mother, her brood of young children and her hard-working husband. There are brilliantly described shopping expeditions, frenetic family holidays abroad and interminable business dinners that have to be endured - where, she recalls, "the thousand guests drifted down (to the dining hall) slow as plankton". The central character in each story is observant, appealing, and begining to rediscover a sense of herself, or get a life, as the title says. "Since the arrival of the children . . . she had broken herself into little pieces like a biscuit and now was scattered all over the place." The toddlers are perfectly captured as the wicked, funny and adorable creatures they are. There are beautifully realised passages and astute descriptions of people and situations. You wish each story would go on and on (except, perhaps, for the awn-out 'Burns and the Bankers', which was possibly the author's intention).