Pauline Mole

George Mole

George was born in 1940 to parents Albert (or Arnold/Arthur) and Edna May Mole. He was the elder brother to Susan Mole, his lesbian sister, who married a woman called Amanda and works in Holloway Prison.

He fell in love with his future wife, Pauline Sugden, and they married, having a son, Adrian. Pauline rejected their child for a year, leaving George to look after him, something Adrian never knew until he was middle aged. George took a job selling electrical storage heaters, but he is later made redundant; he later finds re-employment maintaining the banks of the local canal. George, Pauline and Adrian lived together at their house on Wisteria Walk, Ashby-de-la-Zouch, Leicestershire.

However, he and Pauline had several marital problems, and they both left each other for different people on various occasions. Pauline left George for insurance salesman Alan Lucas in the early 1980s, but later returned (pregnant with Rosie), telling George that the baby was his. Soon after, George left Pauline for his former colleague Doreen Slater, fathering a son, Brett, with her. This hurt Pauline because Brett was a name that she had wanted to call her child, believing all Bretts were successful in life. Eventually, after months of suspicion, George confessed his affair and secret son to Pauline and Adrian on their family holiday to Skegness; Pauline ordered him to return to Doreen, and then got Tania Braithwaite to collect them. George, Doreen and Doreen's son, Maxwell, moved in with George's mother. When Maxwell's father, and Doreen's previous boyfriend, Trevor Roper returns from the army, Doreen swiftly abandons George for Trevor, leading to George reconciling with Pauline. Happiness did not last, and eventually the Moles got divorced in 1990. Pauline got wed to toyboy lover Martin Muffett, twenty-three years her junior, and George started living with his lover Belinda Bellingham, owner of a company selling home security systems. These relationships both end sourly - Martin leaves Pauline for Adrian's girlfriend Bianca, and Belinda throws George out when she discovers that he has been selling her product in back-street boozers for half their retail value.

George and Pauline remarry in 1993, and take on primary responsibility for Adrian's son William, as Adrian is spending most of the week in Soho, working at Savage's Restaurant as head chef. This life continues for a while until the general election, when Adrian's childhood sweetheart Pandora Braithwaite became Ashby-de-la-Zouch's Labour MP in a landslide vote. Pauline, in an initially drunken mistake, had sex with Pandora's father Ivan in Ivan and his wife Tania's gazebo. This developed into an affair, until Pauline and Ivan left their spouses for each other. Tania offered George a shoulder to cry on at the Braithwaite homestead, The Lawns, and they began a relationship, successfully bemusing and confusing Adrian, Pandora, Rosie and William. The couples married, but Pauline and Ivan's happiness was cut short when Ivan drowned on his honeymoon. George and Tania continued living at The Lawns, with George helping Tania transform her house when she was undergoing a Japanese phase, but George falls from a ladder trying to construct a pagoda, breaking his spine and suffering deep cuts from all the credit cards in his pocket. While staying in hospital, George's spine was mended, but he contracted a superbug from some shoddily-cleaned equipment, causing him to be isolated and stay in hospital for upwards of eighteen months. Upon his recovery, Pauline managed to tempt George away from Tania, remarrying for a third and final time. This caused Tania to have a slight breakdown, combined with the loss of Ivan. George and Pauline move from Wisteria Walk to the (fictional) community of Mangold Parva, converting two disused pigsties into housing for themselves and Adrian's new family - Adrian, his wife Daisy and daughter Gracie. George quietens down in his later life, although he breaks his back again and has numerous strokes. He does agree to go on The Jeremy Kyle Show with Pauline, Rosie and Pauline's former lover Alan Lucas, to settle the long-running dispute over Rosie's paternity. When it is proven that Rosie is Lucas's child, George becomes withdrawn, hurt by Rosie's swift rejection of him and making him question if Adrian was his child. He makes amends with Pauline and settles into old age, especially pleased when he discovers that he will become a great-grandfather.

George, like Pauline, is sometimes tactless and inefficient. He has no qualms about showing favouritism for his three children - his favourite was always Rosie, which is why he took it so hard when he discovers Rosie is not his. He does not enjoy talking about his feelings and wants his son to be a "real man", like a computer technician. One of his less attractive qualities is his openly saying that he married Adrian's mother Pauline because of "how good her legs looked in a miniskirt".

Rosie Mole

Brett Slater/Mole

Brett Slater, later Brett Mole, is the result of an affair between George Mole and Doreen Slater in the early 1980s, meaning he is Adrian's half-brother. Brett, a name his father stole from his then-wife Pauline, has an elder half-brother, Maxwell. The Slater family and George lived for a short time with George's mother Edna and eventually Brett moved with his mother and brother to Bournemouth. Brett re-enters Adrian's life in 2001, as an Oxford undergraduate who has been commissioned by Channel 4 to shoot a documentary on a council estate, and chose Adrian's site. Brett is everything Adrian ever wanted to be; rich, successful and popular with women. During the short time he stayed with his brother, he became a role model for Adrian's sons Glenn and William and left cables, cameras and crew all over Adrian's house. When the documentary flopped, Brett and his team disappeared within three hours. Brett re-appeared again in The Prostrate Years as a successful businessman who lost his empire and three riverside apartments in London, Tokyo and New York City to the credit crunch. He informs the Mole family that Doreen Slater died in a motorbike accident which, to Adrian, seemed to be a fabricated version of what really happened - there were a few facts that did not add up. Upon his arrival, Brett proceeded to steal the eyes of Adrian's daughter Gracie, wife Daisy and both Adrian's parents. Brett bought ten-packs of white cotton shirts and threw each one away after only a day’s wear. Adrian clears up after him, stops his brother's alcoholism and generally sorts him out; Brett lives on with Adrian after getting his life back on track before leaving once again.

Jojo

Jojo Mapfumo (previously Mole) is Adrian's first wife and mother of William, his younger son. The couple met when Adrian, still chopping vegetables for Peter Savage, met Jojo on her first day as a waitress, the same job given up by Adrian's ex-girlfriend Bianca. Jojo and Adrian's marriage was short, although long enough to conceive and produce a child, but Jojo's memories are not exactly happy ones. She claims that Adrian's conversation was far from stimulating, and one conversation that agitated her was when Adrian accused her of exaggerating her sneezes. Jojo complains that exaggerating her sneezes is the last thing she would do, being a six-foot, pregnant black woman in extravagant dress. Jojo later divorces Adrian and leaves for her native homeland of Nigeria, with Adrian taking custody of their child. Jojo later marries a Nigerian man who is very successful in business (initially named as Colonel Ephat Mapfumo and later as Wole; it is possible Jojo in fact remarried twice.) Jojo looks up her ex-husband on the internet and faxes him, complete with the information she found on the internet, much to Adrian's agony. William visits his mother and stepfather in London while they are on their honeymoon. Jojo asks if she can take William back to Nigeria, as William is her eldest child and therefore held in high esteem by her family. Adrian tells her that she cannot, so Jojo goes back to Nigeria without her son. Between the events of The Lost Diaries and Weapons of Mass Destruction, Jojo takes William back to Nigeria, much to the heartache of Adrian, Glenn, Pauline and George. William telephones his father, and asks if he can change his name to Wole, like his stepfather's, to which Adrian reluctantly agrees. Jojo's family background is mixed; her father is a Nigerian chief, her mother the owner of a lorry-driving firm, and at the last count there were 204 members of her immediate family.

Daisy Mole

Daisy Mole (née Flowers) is Adrian's second wife and mother of his daughter, Gracie. Daisy is the first daughter of Michael Flowers and only child of his first wife, a Spanish woman named Conchita. Conchita ran away from Michael and infant Daisy when she found love with a butcher named Arthur and besides, Michael was suffocating her with undying love and presents. Daisy is the half-sister of Poppy and Marigold Flowers. Adrian is briefly engaged to Marigold, and only hears things about Daisy, but finally meets her when the Flowers family and the Mole family get together to discuss their offspring's upcoming marriage. Daisy is introduced as a devil-may-care type with Prada handbags and looks to spare. She and Adrian click instantly, and Adrian develops feelings for her that he must conceal. He eventually confides in his parents, George and Pauline, and they agree that Daisy is indeed a beauty. Adrian eventually breaks off the engagement, to the anger of Michael and Marigold's mother Netta, and gets engaged to Daisy; the two later marry. They move into the converted pigsty next to George and Pauline, and produce a daughter named Gracie, who enjoys dressing up as various Disney princesses. Daisy, originally thin, was becoming plumper and plumper until she starts eating whole packets of chocolate Digestives a day. Daisy and Adrian's marriage becomes boring, and Daisy finds comfort with Mangold Parva's local aristocrat, Hugo Fairfax-Lycett, and Daisy moves into the Fairfax-Lycett mansion, just down the road from her and Adrian's house. Pauline laments the loss of Daisy, saying that Daisy was the daughter she deserved. Adrian and Daisy later divorce, with Daisy and Hugo gaining main custody of Gracie. Despite their divorce, the two get on well afterwards. Daisy has never met William, but maintains a friendly relationship with Glenn.

Glenn Bott-Mole

Glenn Bott-Mole is the child of Adrian and Sharon Bott, half-brother to William and Gracie and nephew of Rosie Mole and Marjorie Bott. Rosie describes Glenn to Adrian as 'a psycho, but he has your nose'. Initially, Adrian is unsure of Glenn's parentage; at the time he was conceived, Sharon was seeing Barry Kent as well as Adrian. Regardless of this, Sharon's mother insists that Adrian sends Sharon some money every week to help her get by. However, blood tests prove that Adrian is indeed Glenn's father. Glenn and Adrian meet for the first time on Father's Day 1998, causing a tense atmosphere over the Mole household. Glenn's paternal grandmother, Pauline Mole (then Braithwaite) says that she can like the child, but love could take some working on. Glenn eventually leaves Sharon and moves in with his father and half-brother William. Inside a Mother's Day card for Sharon, Glenn's card reads: "You are mad and always sad, That is why I live with Dad". In his early teens, Glenn becomes obsessed with David Beckham and his family, so much to the point where he gets a Beckham haircut and adopts his accent. He does, however, take pity on his father and at one point takes charge when Adrian is on a low. Glenn later joins the army, and is stationed at Aldershot Barracks. Adrian pays for himself and Glenn to go on holiday to Cyprus, a place where Glenn is later posted. After this, he fights abroad in Afghanistan, much to the horror of Adrian and his parents. When he is on leave, he meets a girl, Finley-Rose. The couple spend Christmas with Finley's grandparents and become engaged. Glenn and Finley-Rose fall deeply in love and she becomes pregnant with Glenn's child, much to the joy of Adrian and his family.

William Mole

William Mole (later Wole Mole) is Adrian's second son through his marriage to Jojo. William is a hyperactive as a child, and becomes the pride and joy of his grandparents, George and Pauline. As a child, he worries Adrian by becoming obsessed with Barbie dolls, asking for a Barbie-themed Easter egg and a Barbie hair-dressing salon for Christmas. Jojo never sees her son, and William never asks about her, yet he surprises Adrian by crying for his mother at the Safeway's crèche. Adrian uses him as an excuse to see Mary-Lou Hattersley, the proprietor of said crèche, with whom Adrian has a slight infatuation. He bribes William with McDonald's, but soon he puts his little foot down and refuses to be taken any longer. William goes to see his mother and her new husband, Wole, on their honeymoon in London. Jojo later claims William and takes him back to Nigeria upon the end of their civil war. William occasionally calls his father, and asks his consent to change his name to Wole like his stepfather. Adrian reluctantly agrees. Adrian deeply misses William, and does not talk about him as the subject is too painful. When Daisy says to Adrian "guess who's next door?!" in The Prostrate Years (meaning Adrian's half-brother Brett), Adrian's first thoughts go to William.

Gracie Mole

Grace Pauline "Gracie" Mole is the daughter of Adrian and Daisy Mole, and Adrian's third child and only daughter. Gracie is, by nature, an obnoxious child who refuses to wear her school uniform and goes in the costumes of various Disney princesses. In the end, her headmistress Mrs. Bull calls in Adrian and tells him to put his foot down, as Gracie's behaviour is attracting too much attention and refers the child to a child psychologist, despite Adrian's assertions that this could be the signs of a gifted child - something Mrs. Bull flatly denied. Gracie usually fights back to any sort of superiority or control over her, but her grandmother Pauline has a special force, to the point that when she is finished with her Gracie is polite, courteous, quiet and wearing school uniform. When Daisy and Adrian separate, the couple share custody of her. Gracie enjoys this, as Daisy's new boyfriend, Hugo Fairfax-Lycett, gives her a pony - something that Gracie has always wanted. Gracie adores her eldest brother, Glenn. She does not like her maternal grandfather, Michael Flowers, as "he looks like a lady with a beard"; a reference to Michael's ponytail.

1980 to 1984

• Mr. Reginald Scruton is the headmaster. His bulging eyes have yielded him the nickname ´Pop-Eye´. He is a strict and intimidating man. Politically, he is a supporter of Thatcher, which does not fall well with some of the students and staff.
• Mr. Lambert-Fossington-Gore (né Lambert) is Adrian's form tutor. He is very kind to Adrian; he takes him to a café where he gives Adrian advice on his domestic situations, however he stops this after the entire class asks him for advice. He later marries Miss Fossington-Gore.
• Mr. Jones is the PE teacher at Neil Armstrong Comprehensive. Adrian describes him as a sadist. He is sacked during Adrian's time off school due to a breakdown, after Adrian writes the headmaster a letter saying that it was Jones who used his nickname "Pop-Eye" most frequently.
• Mrs. Appleyard, the domestic science teacher, who confiscated Barry Kent's Benson & Hedges cigarettes - the teachers were later seen to have been smoking them in the staffroom.
• Mr. Southgate is the Biology teacher.
• Mrs. Claricoates is the school receptionist. In The Lost Diaries, she has progressed to teaching the reception class.
• Mr. Golightly, the Drama teacher.
• Mrs. Figges, the school organist.
• Miss Sproxton is Adrian's [English] teacher.
• Mr. Animba is the school's woodwork teacher.
• Ms Fossington-Gore is Adrian's art teacher. She was in charge of a trip to the British Museum that went so badly she almost resigned from teaching. She later sent Barry Kent home for wearing a Union Jack t-shirt, calling it a symbol of fascism. As noted above, she later marries Mr Lambert.

1999 to 2001

• Roger Patience is the headmaster. He introduced a new informality to Neil Armstrong Comprehensive, in the form of banishing school uniform and asking the children to call him Roger. He regrets these actions, as the school has run amok and dropped severely in the Ofsted ratings.
• Mr. Lunt is the PE teacher at Neil Armstrong Comprehensive. He refuses to allow Glenn to wear tracksuit bottoms when the class do cross-country running through the village. Lunt also takes offence at the rude remarks Adrian makes to the country-dwellers.
• Mr. Billington is the Drama teacher, who choreographed the failed Christmas play, Jesus-In-Las Vegas.
• Nurse McKye is the school nit-nurse.

Neighbours

• Alan Lucas is the Mole family's first neighbour and first boyfriend of Pauline Mole. Alan was an insurance salesman, whose wife left him for another woman - one source of Pauline's embarrassment about the affair. Alan and Pauline ran away to Sheffield, Alan's hunting ground, and here the two bought a flat decorated in the worst taste possible. Alan tried his hardest to get along with his girlfriend's son, but Adrian was still cross with him for stealing his mother. Alan fathered Adrian's half-sister Rosie, and there was much mystery around her parentage. In The Prostate Years, Pauline, Alan, George and Rosie go on The Jeremy Kyle Show to confirm who her father was; the lie detector results showed that Alan Lucas was indeed Rosie's father. Rosie changed her name to Rosie Lucas, called Alan "Dad" and called Adrian's father "George". Pauline was unsure of the father herself but had strong suspicions; she did not possess the Mole cack-handedness and accident prone-ness.
• Mrs. Lucas is the divorced wife of Alan Lucas. She kept the house in check, doing the plumbing, gardening and odd jobs; when she left her husband for another woman, she and the removal women stood and laughed at Alan as he looked down from the window, ashen faced.
• Declan and Caitlin O'Leary are the heads of an Irish family over the road from the Mole family. Mr. O'Leary is a drunk and Mrs. O'Leary is a gossip. They have at least three children; namely Brendan, Sean and Bridget.
• Mr. Singh and his wife Sita move into the house recently vacated by Alan Lucas. When they arrive, Mr. Singh is outraged to find a stack of dirty magazines (named "Amateur Photographer") underneath a loose floorboard. Mrs. Singh is very pretty, keeping her figure hidden behind a sari. The Singhs have lots of children, but the total amount is never specified. Mr. Singh had to leave soon after to care for his ailing parents, leaving his family alone, but later returns. Mrs. Singh looks after Bert Baxter occasionally, but she must be chaperoned and in the end just got rid of him on a Hindu coach trip to Bradford.

Around Town

• Doreen "Stick Insect" Slater is George Mole's mistress and the mother of his son Brett. She already has a son, Maxwell, by her fiancé Trevor Roper. Doreen is described as thin from top to bottom with no chest, no bum, buck teeth and ginger hair, which leads to her nickname Stick Insect. She slept with George Mole on several occasions - Adrian notices the ginger hairs left on his mother's pillow. After spending a fortune on flowers in a (failed) attempt to woo Pauline, George packs the flowers into the back of his car and drives off in the direction of Doreen's house. Doreen shows up on the Mole family doorstep after Pauline returns, and shows George her baby bump. George is worried, and breaks the news to Pauline and Adrian on holiday in Skegness. Pauline sends him away to look after Doreen, while Pauline calls on Tania Braithwaite to take her home, as well as Tania providing a shoulder to cry on. Doreen dies in a motorbike accident in The Prostrate Years. Brett returns to tell George, Pauline and Adrian, and the family travel down to Bournemouth for Doreen's funeral. Doreen's family look down on George, especially when Maxwell, the vicar, says that Doreen once quoted: "George Mole is the only man I'll ever love; I just live for the day when he'll come back to me". George confides in Adrian that, since Brett's birth, he has been sending £20 a week to her to help her get by. Whether Doreen and Trevor Roper ever get married is not told, but the events at the funeral hint that they never did get married. Doreen became a Hells Angel after her relocation, and this contributes to her death. Doreen dies on 8 August 2007.
• Trevor Roper is Doreen Slater's boyfriend who returns from the Middle East to reclaim her and Maxwell, complete with shedloads of tax-free money and stuffed toy camels. He does not mind about Brett, who was born in his absence; he thinks he was the result of a faulty "coitus interruptus". He and Doreen planned to marry when his divorce came through, but they obviously did not achieve this as she died with her maiden name.
• Rick Lemon is the head of the Off-The-Streets Youth Club. He ends up barring Barry Kent and his skinhead gang, as they cause much of the trouble. Rick takes the entire Club on a hike across the moors, but ends up taking them in totally the wrong direction and gets a telling off from the police. Rick advises Adrian to take life less seriously and have more fun. He is engaged to a woman named Titania, known as 'Tit', and the couple have a baby girl.
• Mr. Cherry is the owner of the local newsagents shop. He takes Adrian on as paper boy and gives him the morning round on Pandora's street, much to his delight. Adrian turned down the evening round on Corporation Row; Barry Kent lives there for a start. Mr. Cherry gave him a pornographic magazine, Big & Bouncy, but Adrian later resigned from his post as paperboy and it states in his cv: "Paperboy at Cherry's Newsagents: resigned after Mr. Cherry tried to pervert me with issues of Big & Bouncy".
• Frederick Kent is Clive and Barry's father. He protests to the local newspaper when Barry is sent home from school for wearing a Union Jack T-shirt; the paper presents the Kents as patriots treated poorly by the school. Frederick is bizarrely described as a World War II veteran alongside a reference to his age - 45 in 1982.
• Edna Kent (previously referred to as Ida Kent) is the mother of Barry Kent. Edna is a rather large woman, who cleans toilets for a living, much to her shame and disgust; though she later attends university and graduates with two degrees. Edna and Barry are in attendance at Pandora's celebration of becoming Leicester's first Labour MP for fifty years. Edna was wearing a green dress with a gold belt. Edna appears sporadically throughout the books. Edna is a widow, as her husband Frederick's death is referenced to in True Confessions. As well as Barry, Frederick and Edna have another son, Clive, and several assorted youngsters.
• Courtney Elliot is the Mole's erudite ex-academic postman with a red-spotted bowtie and a ruffled shirt. He helped Adrian study for his GCE tests. He lends Pauline Mole a fiver when her giro fails to arrive.
• Christine Spicer-Woods represents an independent political party called S.L.A.G. (Socialist Lesbians Against Globalisation) and runs for Leicester MP in the 1997 election; she is defeated when Pandora Braithwaite wins the seat for Labour.
• Mrs Parvez runs Kidcare, the nursery school that William attends. She regularly sends notes home with William, asking for money for various expenses. When William asked where birds sleep at night, Adrian and Mrs Parvez gave him different answers, and got into an argument with each other over who was right. Although Mrs Parvez disapproves of Adrian's parenting style, she has great sympathy for William; at one point getting angry when Adrian was very late and heartbroken William thought he had been abandoned. She is also a Liberal representative on the local council. It is unclear whether she is related to Adrian's friend Mohammed Parvez.
• Lucy is a nurse at Leicester Royal Infirmary, where William goes for an emergency appendix operation. She is a single mother with a three-year-old daughter named Lucinda. Lucy seems to be attracted to Adrian, and Pauline is keen to set them up together; but Adrian rejects Lucy, put off by her hairy wrists (although Pauline suggests he simply buy her a tube of Nair.)

Neighbours

• Vince and Peggy Ludlow are Adrian's neighbours after he moves into his new house with his two sons. The Ludlows and the Moles are separated by a party wall. The family patriarch is a drunkard named Vince who gets arrested for £140 in arrears early through the book, much to the speculation of the street, but Vince returns a few weeks later. The matriarch is a middle-aged lush named Peggy that Adrian takes a fancy to. Peggy dresses in tight leopard-print clothing, all of which is revealing. Both the Ludlows are smokers. They have three dogs and seven children, one of whom is named Brandon and was in a prison abroad. Brandon Ludlow was arrested with a lot of football louts; Peggy says that she will sue the Belgian president, once she finds out who he is. Peggy tells Adrian that Brandon is not like any of her and Vince's other children; Brandon is gentle and takes more of an interest in books than in football. Upon his return, the Ludlow family throw him a party, their second after the celebration they threw when Vince returned from prison. The Ludlows also have a baby daughter that Adrian unofficially names Emily, who he takes shopping as an excuse to see Mary-Lou Hattersly, who runs the crèche at the local Safeway's supermarket. The Ludlow family are fans of The Jerry Springer Show. Peggy finds Vince in bed with their son's best friend, Mandy Trotter, and later says that Mandy is pregnant with Vince's child.
• Sandra Alcock is one of the slags who lives on the Gaitskell Estate. She has a one-night stand with Brett Mole. Adrian discovers her sitting at his kitchen table one morning, and he asks her to cover herself up; she does so by sticking a tea-towel in her bra straps. She later stands under Brett's bedroom window, shouting that Brett is a bastard and that Justine Turner, the girl Brett had cheated on Sandra with, was a slut. The police later arrive and take both Sandra and Justine away.
• Wayne Drabble is an arsonist who burnt down the local Scout hut. In what Adrian describes as "a daring social experiment", Wayne is put in charge of the fireworks display on the common.

Around Town

• Mrs Parvez runs Kidcare, the nursery school that William attends. She regularly sends notes home with William, asking for money for various expenses. When William asked where birds sleep at night, Adrian and Mrs Parvez gave him different answers, and got into an argument with each other over who was right. Although Mrs Parvez disapproves of Adrian's parenting style, she has great sympathy for William; at one point getting angry when Adrian was very late and heartbroken William thought he had been abandoned. She is also a Liberal representative on the local council. It is unclear whether she is related to Adrian's friend Mohammed Parvez.

Neighbours

• Professor Frank Green is the man occupying the flat underneath Adrian's. He is a professor of science and works at Leicester University. He is a kind, middle-aged man who is more sympathetic than Mia, Adrian's upstairs neighbour. He helps Adrian carry his talking refrigerator from the car park to his flat. He and Mia get agitated at the loud volume at which Adrian plays his music.
• Mia Fox is Adrian's upstairs neighbour. She is a pretty woman, but is mean and insists on peace at all times. She lives a simple life, and maintains absolute silence from Adrian. She, unlike Professor Green, is not happy with Adrian's arrival. Both Mia and Professor Green get agitated by the loud volume at which Adrian plays his music. She works as an air-traffic controller at East Midlands Airport.

Around Town

Around Town

• Hugo Fairfax-Lycett is Mangold Parva's local aristocrat. He frequents the Bear Inn and, like many others of his fellow barflies, dislikes the smoking ban. He employs Daisy Mole as his PA, a job she previously held in London. Hugo and Daisy eventually develop feelings for each other and start an affair, leading to Daisy leaving Adrian, with the two sharing custody of their daughter Gracie. The couple decide to convert the land surrounding Fairfax Hall into a safari park, much to the anguish of the villagers. They themselves form a mob and march to Fairfax Hall. Hugo, rather conveniently, decides to go for a spin in his quad bike, but after some hours does not return. Daisy calls Adrian and the villagers form a search party, the men hunting Hugo and the women, George and Adrian staying behind to comfort Daisy. Hugo is found underneath his quad bike, having crashed and suffering from minor concussion. After making a full recovery, he and Daisy open up Fairfax Hall to the public, allowing Nigel and Lance to conduct their wedding there. Hugo has two daughters from a previous marriage.
• Mrs. Dorothea Lewis-Masters is an elderly resident of Mangold Parva, and is later engaged to Bernard Hopkins. She writes to her illegitimate son in Timbuktu, the result of an affair between herself and one of her servants when she lived in India. Wendy Wellbeck tells Adrian that she writes to him once a fortnight, sends cards at Christmas and Easter and a birthday card in July. This surprises Adrian; he describes her as "the type of woman who only ever wrote to some distant relation in Sydenham about knitting patterns and the trials of dealing with ones bank via their call centre in Calcutta". She walks with the assistance of a zimmer frame. She and Bernard Hopkins meet and promptly fall in love; yet, Bernard's estranged wife is still alive and living down South. Bernard does not tell Dorothea about his wife, and the two remain engaged. She strongly dislikes hanging baskets - she says that, were she younger, she would steal out at night and deface them, describing them as "the Margaret Thatcher of flower decorations!". She speaks with a strong upper-class accent.
• Tom and Kath Urquhart are the landlords of the local pub, the Bear Inn. The Urquharts marriage is fairly rocky, as Adrian observes Kath and the Bear Inn's trainee chef, Jamie Briton, in an embrace in the steamy kitchen. The Urquharts do a carvery in their pub, all of it microwaved. The Bear Inn is closed down towards the ending of The Prostrate Years, and the Urquharts cash up and move away from Mangold Parva for good.
• Tony and Wendy Wellbeck are the managers of the local post office. Adrian says that the Wellbecks have long since lost track of their stock, as everything is jumbled together. Wendy is somewhat of a village gossip; she is a devout watcher of television soap operas and quips about Adrian's frequent purchases of notepads. Tony, however, respects his fellow villagers and tries to keep his wife from offending everybody. Wendy is in the middle of writing a novel, Puppies and Primroses, which she asks Adrian to read - Adrian knows that from page one he will want to throw up.
• Mrs. Golightly is the grossly overweight maid-of-all-work employed by Mrs. Lewis-Masters. She asks Adrian for a part in his latest play, Plague!, and reveals that she has been compared to Hattie Jacques. She is ultrasensitive about her weight; Mrs. Golightly says that it is her glands, but her employer puts it down to living off Swiss roll. Adrian later sees her in the Bear with her "hang-dog" husband.
• Simon is Mangold Parva's local vicar. Adrian sends him the manuscript for his new village play, Plague!. Simon promises to show the manuscript to his wife, once she has finished reading the complete works of Iris Murdoch.
• Marlene Webb owns the local dog kennels, and has 'positively medieval' teeth.
• Lee Grant and Jamie Briton are the chefs at the Bear Inn.