Shelley Conn: 'The presence gets a bit unnerving'

In 2010, heavily pregnant Nisha Parekh is struggling to settle into her new home, Marchlands (ITV1, Thursday). Here, Shelley Conn tells us more... Tell us a bit about Nisha? "Nisha has just moved to Marchlands, a fairly rundown house, with her partner Mark and we're about to have a baby. Nisha's a lawyer, so she's used to living in the city and leading quite a high-flying life. She's settling down and getting into the nesting mode and looking forward to a bright future with a family." But things aren't exactly going to plan, are they? "Nisha starts to feel the presence and hauntings of this little girl, Alice, who died in the Sixties. To begin with, I think she's quite enchanted by that and loves this connection with the past, but it starts to get a bit unnerving." Nisha's already feeling vulnerable - and Mark's not really helping is he? "Nisha feels that Mark is keeping things from her and she's very suspicious. She has hormones raging around her body and is not always being reasonable, but he's definitely withholding the truth to some extent." Mark arranges for a local woman to help around the house. But Nisha doesn't appreciate the surprise, does she? "Nisha is reluctant to take on the helper at first because she's just far too independent to want that help. But Nisha really takes to her and begins to regard her as a mother figure." Who is this woman? And does she have an ulterior motive? "Nisha's not aware that the helper has her own agenda at all and ends up looking to her for advice. Gradually, Nisha discovers the helper may not be all she seems..."

Patrick McLennan is a London-based journalist and documentary maker who has worked as a writer, sub-editor, digital editor and TV producer in the UK and New Zealand. His CV includes spells as a news producer at the BBC and TVNZ, as well as web editor for Time Inc UK. He has produced TV news and entertainment features on personalities as diverse as Nick Cave, Tom Hardy, Clive James, Jodie Marsh and Kevin Bacon and he co-produced and directed The Ponds, which has screened in UK cinemas, BBC Four and is currently available on Netflix.

An entertainment writer with a diverse taste in TV and film, he lists Seinfeld, The Sopranos, The Chase, The Thick of It and Detectorists among his favourite shows, but steers well clear of most sci-fi.