Sometimes a book doesn’t need to shout to make an impact. This Family is one of those books – it’s quiet, unassuming and yet it stays in your mind once it’s finished. Dystopian Fiction Books Everyone Should Read: Explore The Darker Side of Possible Worlds and Alternative Futures A tender yet vivid novel in both form and voice, its threads as bright as the tapestry of life it depicts. I lived, laughed and ached for these characters throughout. A superb accomplishment’ – Wiz Wharton

When many of us were approved for this book on Netgalley around the same time, the lovely @kimsreadingadventure hosted a buddy read at the beginning of March.All the characters are distinct, sensitively depicted and feel so very real, eldest daughter Emma has been living in California and its hinted that she is at the heart of a major conflict, Phoebe, an ex-alcoholic, sweeps in with her famous actor partner, Michael Regis, and their 2 children, the young Clara and baby Albie, and medic Rosie is with boyfriend, Danyal. Mary has raised them all here, as we slowly learn of their childhoods, the chaos and mayhem, their changing relationships through the years as they become adults, scattering upon leaving for university. All of them were close to Iain and Liz, Mary's closest friends through the years after their unforgettable meeting involving pigs at a market when she was pregnant with Emma. We don't find out who Mary is marrying until almost half way through, is this a family that will be able to reconcile? And just when we think the dramas are over, a terrifyingly scary event unfolds near the end. An ambitious new novel of family life past and present from the author of the Costa Book Awards shortlisted The Stranding. This is like a latter day Mary Wesley read with its incisive observations. I loved it. It is a beautifully written book.

There is Mary’s eldest, Emma who is flying in from Los Angeles, Phoebe, a journalist and alcoholic with her partner, actor Michael Regis and their two young kids. There is Rosie ( not a biological daughter) with her partner, Danyal. There is also Mary‘s mother-in-law, Irene with whom she has had a fractious relationship over the years. Irene, of the “don’t read at the table dear” history. I’d spit in her eye for that if she were my mother in law, I thought as I read it ! Weirdly, her ex husband, Richard ( a difficult character at the best of times) is cooking a pig on a spit for the wedding celebrations. They are all trying to hold things together for Mary’s sake, as she’s a kind and enveloping person who does so much for others. Lyrical, literary and luminous ... buy it and treat yourself to writing at its finest." - Bethany CliftIn a dual timeline that switches cleverly from the day itself to the past (no specific dates are given but the switch from present to past tense denotes the change), we begin to understand the threads that hold this family together, and the stitches that have torn apart over the years. Subtle, intelligent, and so deeply moving . . . people who just feel so achingly real. Extraordinary -- A. J. West