Fav author: Marian Keyes
Just bought this novel by Irish author Keyes called "the other side of the story". read all her other novels, they are fan-tas-tic. hilarious, but not slap-stick, with characters i can easily identify with i.e. dysfunctional protaganists, or rather protaganists with dysfunctional lives. haha.
The first part talks about 32-year old Gemma Hogan. She's the only child and her aged parents' marriage has broken up. Her dad, Noel Hogan hooked up with Collete, his PA who's 4 years older than Gemma, with 2 kids from a previous relationship, and left home one Tuesday morning. Thence, Gemma has had to live with her Mam Maureen, to placate Maureen's panic attacks, which she often mistakens to be heart attacks. Gemma finds that she's not let out of the house other than to work and to the chemist to get Maureen's tranqs and sleeping pills. Maureen even refuses to change out of the dressing gown she wore on the morning Noel left, and keeps his porridge bowl (with the leftovers still intact, as if preserving it for forensics) in her dressing gown pocket. Gemma discovers she's losing the life she had carefully built since moving out of her parents' home, and how uncomfortable she feels of having a broken home at the age of 32. She wakes up frightened at 5am everyday, scared to death that this is how her life would pan out from hence. And she keeps praying that Noel will come home soon. Using her vivid imagination, she fantasises about how her dad is suffering with Collete, how Maureen finds a new man, etc. Gemma herself, lost her boyfriend to her ex-best friend Lily, who's just written this wonderfully received novel, making her life even less bearable.
Told you it's a good book with a huge dose of irish humour thrown in for good measure too. I'm only page 90 and i'm already hooked. haha.
Just bought this novel by Irish author Keyes called "the other side of the story". read all her other novels, they are fan-tas-tic. hilarious, but not slap-stick, with characters i can easily identify with i.e. dysfunctional protaganists, or rather protaganists with dysfunctional lives. haha.
The first part talks about 32-year old Gemma Hogan. She's the only child and her aged parents' marriage has broken up. Her dad, Noel Hogan hooked up with Collete, his PA who's 4 years older than Gemma, with 2 kids from a previous relationship, and left home one Tuesday morning. Thence, Gemma has had to live with her Mam Maureen, to placate Maureen's panic attacks, which she often mistakens to be heart attacks. Gemma finds that she's not let out of the house other than to work and to the chemist to get Maureen's tranqs and sleeping pills. Maureen even refuses to change out of the dressing gown she wore on the morning Noel left, and keeps his porridge bowl (with the leftovers still intact, as if preserving it for forensics) in her dressing gown pocket. Gemma discovers she's losing the life she had carefully built since moving out of her parents' home, and how uncomfortable she feels of having a broken home at the age of 32. She wakes up frightened at 5am everyday, scared to death that this is how her life would pan out from hence. And she keeps praying that Noel will come home soon. Using her vivid imagination, she fantasises about how her dad is suffering with Collete, how Maureen finds a new man, etc. Gemma herself, lost her boyfriend to her ex-best friend Lily, who's just written this wonderfully received novel, making her life even less bearable.
Told you it's a good book with a huge dose of irish humour thrown in for good measure too. I'm only page 90 and i'm already hooked. haha.
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