Description

The author of The Most Fun We Ever Had returns with a brilliantly observed family drama, in which a long marriage faces imminent derailment from events both past and present
‘I finished this wonderful book in floods of tears. What a joy to let a writer of such talent suffuse us with a life’s worth of humour and pain, affection and mess’ Jessie Burton

‘Witty and insightful. A powerful exploration of marriage, motherhood and self’ Bonnie Garmus

‘One of those big, grown-up existential novels about parenthood and marriage and teenagers and friendship and family life . . . Both easy reading and profound at the same time, all of it cleverly brushed with wit and humour’ Matt Haig

At fifty-seven, Julia Ames has found herself with an improbably lovely life. Despite her inclination towards self-sabotage, she has a husband she loves, two happy children and a quiet, contented existence in the suburbs.

But, out of the blue, things begin to change.

Her always well-behaved son is acting strangely. Her beloved but belligerent teenage daughter is about to depart for college.

And, in the local grocery store, Julia encounters a woman she hasn’t seen for twenty years – a woman whose friendship was once both her lifeline and, very nearly, her downfall.

All of a sudden, Julia’s peaceful family setup and her long, affection-filled marriage face imminent derailment from events both past and present.

The author of The Most Fun We Ever Had returns with another brilliantly observed family drama, which examines the complete and complicated trajectory of one woman’s life and asks what it takes to make – and to not break – a family.

‘We are treated to our protagonist’s complicated and revelatory inner life. I loved it’ Eva Wiseman, Observer

‘It was such a pleasure to bury myself in this book. It moved and surprised me’ Clare Chambers

‘Infidelity, dysfunction, secrets – this family novel delivers. Lombardo refashions domestic drama into something rich and strange, with echoes of Lorrie Moore’s sardonic humour and Jonathan Franzen’s dissection of class’ New York Times

Publisher Review

Witty and insightful. A powerful exploration of marriage, motherhood, and self — Bonnie Garmus, author of LESSONS IN CHEMISTRY It was such a pleasure to bury myself in this book, a literary novel of family life which moved and surprised me. Claire Lombardo creates such interesting characters and predicaments and manipulates the revelations and emotional bombshells so expertly that you read on ravenously — Clare Chambers, author of SMALL PLEASURES This is such a wonderful book: unsentimental yet full of feeling, with such sharply-written, loving and generous characterisation. It has everything I adore in a novel. I finished it in floods of tears, and had to sit for a minute or two to pull myself together. It absolutely floored me. What a joy to let a writer of such talent suffuse us with a life’s worth of humour and pain, affection and mess! — Jessie Burton, author of THE MINIATURIST A big American novel to get totally lost in. Rich and compelling and funny and true — Claire Powell, author of AT THE TABLE Pitch-perfect. . . Lombardo is compulsively readable and consistently funny, and it’s impossible to look away as Julia continues to self-sabotage. This domestic drama hits all the right notes * Publisher’s Weekly (Starred Review) * A family saga to save as a treat and devour when you should be doing something else, in which events past and present upset a long marriage * Independent * Lombardo loves her characters, taking time to peel back each of their layers through the time-lapse structure of the novel and her rich descriptions. . . A sure bet for fans of Richard Russo and Jane Smiley * Booklist * Sparkling. . . Readers will be torn between their instinct to race to the finish and their desire to savour every page * Publisher’s Weekly Summer Reads *