Thank you so much @penguinukbooks for gifting me a free copy of Ask Again, Yes! It was pretty much a given that I’d enjoy this one as I’m a sucker for a sprawling family drama, and I’m happy to say I wasn’t disappointed!
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I can never quite articulate why I love family dramas so much - I find it endlessly fascinating to peer through someone’s front door into lives that we usually only see snapshots of. You never quite know what’s going on behind those doors in real life, and fiction reminds us that no matter how perfect someone’s life may seem, the issues, regrets, and also acts of love and kindness, are always there, known only to those involved.
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Spanning four decades, this is the story of Kate and Peter, who end up together despite the event which tore both their families, who lived next door to one another when they were young, apart for good. We get to see them as kids, teenagers, young adults, middle aged, the consequences of that one minute playing out, some of them not emerging until years later.
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I would love to see Keane come out with another book in the future from Anne’s point of view. The depiction of mental illness in this book doesn’t shy away - it’s perhaps a bit exaggerated, but I think it gets across how attitudes and treatments towards mental health have changed. Anne not getting the treatment she needed in the 80s and 90s is the impetus for the story, and I’d have liked to see more of her own story included, rather than the effect it had on all the others in her life.
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Keane’s style is great - It took me a while to read this one because @jobis89 was visiting me, but every time I did manage to pick it up, it was easy to slide ride back into the story!