"Delightful - very endearing!" The village of Hawksbury Hollow is nestled in the shadow of the English South Downs. It''s late December and unbeknown to the residents, the coldest and most dangerous spell of weather since records began, is about to hit. Just before the snowfall starts in earnest, Fen Martin moves into Rose Cottage. Without any family to look out for her, Fen is grateful for the support offered by her new neighbours but the last thing she is looking for is love. Against her will, Fen is drawn to the solemn but seriously attractive Daniel Anderson who owns neighbouring Riverside Farm. As the ice and snow build up outside and emergency situations start to become the norm, the residents are forced to seek refuge with each other. Amidst a backdrop of extreme conditions, both Daniel and Fen are forced to confront their pasts in order that they might enjoy a brighter future. Fen slept surprisingly well but was woken, just before dawn, by the deafening and wholly unexpected sound of utter silence.

Lying still and savouring the moment, she cuddled a sleepy Merlin, her faithful canine who was curled up beside her on the goose down duvet. With a rush of excitement, she decided to get up early and make the absolute most of the first full day of her new life, by watching the sunrise. Twenty minutes later, Fen was wrapped up snugly in a ridiculous number of layers, including a scarf, gloves and her favourite bobble hat. But upon opening the back door and taking her first step outside, it was clear that all her preparations had been in vain. The comfortable temperature of her cottage, compared to the frigid dawn air, provided a shocking temperature extreme. The blast of freezing air, which immediately permeated through her layers of clothing, all but took her breath away. Merlin had no such qualms and pushed past Fen''s legs, sprinting straight down the long garden, finally becoming lost in the strange, pre-dawn, grey light. Closing the door quickly behind her, eyes watering painfully from the intense cold, Fen looked up to see each and every star beaming down at her and the moon shining whiter than she had ever witnessed.

The morning was nothing short of a stargazer''s paradise, although on second thoughts maybe not, with the greenhouse thermometer displaying a glacial minus eleven degrees!As Fen reached the darkness at the bottom of her garden, she heard grunts and heavy breathing from the neighbouring field. In Merlin''s excitement, he had scared a herd of cows back away from the hedge. ''Sorry girls,'' murmured Fen. ''Hang on, let me make it up to you.'' Darting back up the garden and into her kitchen, she rummaged through the cupboards in search of a cow-friendly treat. However, all her tingling hands could manage to find was a packet of biscuits. Shrugging, Fen grabbed them and headed back down the garden once more. The sunrise across the huge open fields that lay behind her house was a spectacular thing.

Fen found her body slowly becoming accustomed to the cold, much like the body''s submission that follows diving into a cold swimming pool. Gradually, the black sky began to turn dark blue and then the palest yellow, as the sun slowly made its way from beneath the horizon and fingers of light warmed the frozen earth. Fen stood entranced, despite the cold. Occasionally, she shared her digestive biscuits with the nosy, sandpaper-rough tongued cows, of which they seemed very appreciative. The yellow sky metamorphosed quickly to the brightest orange as suddenly the top of a great fiery, orange ball appeared on the horizon like a huge, pre-historic monster. As the vivid hues reflected back down on the underside of a small number of cotton wool clouds that had moved into range, to Fen it looked as though the sky was ablaze. How easy it was to imagine that in days gone by, such a sight would invoke fear within communities, believing it to be a punishment for angering the Gods.