This short book is a combination of two novellas. The first, 'I Can Make it to California Before it's Time for Dinner' tells of an unfortunate teenaged boy with learning difficulties who goes on an impromptu journey and gets blamed for a girl's death, then taken advantage of by an older man. The boy, Jimmy Dembrowski, is well realised as only half-understanding what goes on around him and not understanding strange people's motivations.

The second story, 'May-September' is quite a different matter. Sandra is a grandmother whose daughter Andrea has talked her into writing a blog. This will keep Andrea's kids up to date with her life and help Sandra keep in touch with the modern world. Reluctant but hiding it, Sandra buys a computer. She posts up an ad and Alice answers, a young woman who is willing to help with computer skills and ghostwriting the blog.

There are no quotation marks in the latter story which can make it difficult to follow and to be sure of who is saying which sentence. Sandra is only sixty-seven and she and Alice swap details of their lives. The women in this story are absorbed with themselves and Sandra tends to look back over her life rather than look outward through the worldwide web, as most people would when handed a net- connected computer.

COULD YOU BE WITH HER NOW is not a casual read but concentrates on drawing characters and could suit students of modern creative writing. Jen Micalski has founded a quarterly creative journal called jmww.