Despite her family's ailing finances, Diana Athill's childhood - spent in a lovely house in Norfolk - was blissful.In 1932, she fell in love with Paul: an undergraduate who tutored her younger brother.Within several years, she had moved to Oxford to study and they were engaged to be married.Then everything fell apart in the cruellest possible way. Athill's debut is also her most personal: a dissection of personal tragedy and the struggle to rebuild her life amid severe disappointment and loneliness.Unfolding throughout the Second World War, Instead of a Letter is an inspiring story of love and loss, heartbreak and hope, and a testament to her strength of character - her vivacity, honesty and perspicacity.