The Ghost Wall writer on how her darkly comic new novel was inspired by climate emergency and her Brexit dismay

Sarah Moss’s seventh novel hits the ground running: it’s early morning in the Scottish Highlands and the runner is Justine, middle-aged mother of two boys. “There won’t be a plane this summer, or next. Who could afford to travel, now?” she wonders, as she struggles into her sports bra and sets off at a lick along the rain-lashed shores of a loch.

Justine’s voice sucks you in, instantly recognisable to anyone who has ever found themselves in a close holiday confinement with their nearest and dearest: she’s peevish about the proximity of other people’s bodily functions, rueful about the exotic places she never visited, and determined to colonise the one part of the day that is hers alone, regardless of the weather.