'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' CLARE CHAMBERS, author of SMALL PLEASURES'Such a wonderful book . . . 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 family saga to save as a treat and devour when you should be doing something else'INDEPENDENT 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.