UPSTREAM is a powerful portrait of life in Britain and Ireland during the last quarter of the 20th century, acutely observed by aspiring author Jim Mitchell as he and wife Bridget settle into a new life in the West Country.

The story centres on the married life of Jim and Bridget, the births of their children and the flow of people and events around them as they make the spiritual journey "upstream" to the source of life and meaning, against an increasingly unfeeling, commercialised world where the individual has come to count less and less.