I'm bringing this book to our Meetup tonight for fellow BC'er mbmeadow.

Thanks a lot! I hope to get to it soon.

A nice, light tale of people at loose ends coming together for the holidays in Scotland. The characters are introduced separately, and at one point, it's disconcerting, because I'd forgotten who one of the characters was, since it'd been so long since he'd been introduced.
Elfrida is an old actress who settles into a small town and makes friends with a couple and their daughter. The wife and daughter later die, and Elfrida goes with the husband to the house he half-owns.
Elfrida's distant relation, Carrie, is at loose ends after coming back home after a break-up. Carrie's niece is also being abandoned by her selfish grandmother and mother. Sam is coming back to England after six years away after separating from his wife.
They all end up in the same house, and growing together as the family that none of them figuratively has any more.
The book is a good, nice, light read, but completely predictable. And all of their predicaments seem so dramatic, and yet so convenient that they all seem to get their amount of healing out of the deal.