Philippa Dunne

Post her divorce, Amanda has had to downsize and up sticks to South Harlesden, or as the Estate Agent calls it SoHa (definitely not the area around Wormwood Scrubs prison). With both Manus and Georgie now at secondary school, Amanda has to try and get her head around raising teenagers, dealing with modern motherhood horrors like teenage drinking, fake Instagram accounts and eco anxiety. Not even a woman as certain of her parenting as Amanda can deal with these nightmares alone. Then there's Amanda's mother Felicity who is constantly around, and completely in denial that she is, in fact, lonely. Theirs is a slightly unhealthy co-dependent relationship based on backhanded compliments and veiled snipes about her new home. After a brief spell of freedom, Anne is sucked back into being Amanda's minion to help her navigate the social scene with the other parents at the children's new school. Thank God for Anne.

Lorna Brady is a woman from the small, fictional town of Kilkinure, who wakes one morning to find a corpse in her house. Chillingly, Lorna has no idea who the dead woman is or if she herself might be responsible for the apparent murder... That's because Lorna has long suffered from extreme bouts of sleepwalking, understood to have manifested around the time she was ripped from her life at the age of 15 and incarcerated in the Kilkinure Convent.

Meet the Alpha Mums, headed by Amanda, very much the queen bee. Everything is organised, clean and sparkly - even the kitchen cork board is a statement of success. At the other end of the spectrum, we meet Liz, who is totally chaotic and feels the kids should enjoy free expression - if they want to do kamikaze jumps of the sofa, she drags a mattress round for safety. Somewhere between Amanda and Liz is Julia - she is organised - she has to be as she is a successful events organiser - but when her mother Marion decides she is no longer going to be the free child-sitter and school-run taxi, Julia finds her organisation skills are taxed and nowhere near the level of the Alpha Mums. Also in the mix is Kevin - he is the stay-at-home dad, who, rather than fighting against that, is embracing it with gusto - much to the irritation of the other mums. This is mothers and they really are - coping or not - competitive and helpful. If the Pulling girls had kids, this is what it would be like.

Following the Walshes a typical Irish family living in West Dublin were the kids are outgrowing the family home since the state of the Irish economy has forced the kids Ciara and Rory to live at home with Mammy, Carmel and Dad, Tony.