THIS YEAR IT WILL BE DIFFERENTand other storiesChristmas: a time of year when emotions run high and long-held secrets can unexpectedly surface...This Year It Will Be Different powerfully evokes the lives of wives, husbands, children, friends and lovers. As the festivities take hold, there are step-families grappling with exes, long-married couples faced with in-law problems, a wandering husband choosing between the other woman and his wife, a child caught up in a grown-up tug-of-war.'With her gift for effortless characterisation . . . she evokes power shifts in families, unwelcome discoveries, conspiracies, affairs, forgiveness, sorrow and the rebirth of optimism with her usual warmth and sympathy' Elizabeth Buchan, Sunday Timeswww.maevebinchy.comSOME OF THE STORIES WERE PREVIOUSLY PUBLISHED IN THE RETURN JOURNEY