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Clover Jones and Laura Dangerfield have been best friends since their children were born. Along with Clover's stylish, powerful friend, Alice, they share holidays, sleepovers, school runs and childcare.
But when the children leave home, secrets and lies are exposed and the old rules no longer seem to apply. How can two very different marriages - and three close friendships - survive?
The back cover says Nina Bell: fiction that gets under the skin of family dynamics.
How true!
The story is set around three families.
Clover and George Jones and their children Ben and Holly - They are alone now for the first time in a long time, can they survive?
Tim and Laura Dangerfield and their son Jamie - Interesting reading about Laura's feelings when times got tough for Tim.
Alice and her daughter Lola - Single-parent, successful business woman, has it all, or does she?
The dynamics of the group and character traits were clearly laid out early on in the story so I could settle into the storyline about how the children flying the nest would change these people's lives.
The storyline flowed and the engaging dialogue between the characters, throughout, not only made me want to join in discussions but kept me changing my mind about who was up to what, with who, and why. I enjoyed the way characters would chat and analyse each other.
Secrets were being kept, trust was being tested, and many things were not being said between friends and husbands. It is not always what you do say but what you don't say that matters in a friendship or relationship.
It is very difficult to say how I felt about the characters in this book without giving away too much of the story. There were characters I was not keen on during the story, but by the end of the book I began to understand why they acted they way they did.
This is my first encounter with Nina Bell's writing and I loved it. I want more.
This novel gave me a great big hug but also made me do a little self-evaluation. Very therapeutic read.
5 out of 5 for me!
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