That is the function of books: they offer a point of view, they offer many conflicting points of view, they provoke thought, they provoke irritation and admiration and speculation. They take you out of yourself and put you down somewhere else from whence you never entirely return.
This is essentially a family saga, written as a collection of short descriptive passages capturing significant, or everyday but revealing, moments in a manner which sometimes resembles a collage or photograph album more than a linear narrative. The shifts of focus between the generations are handled smoothly and draw your affections and interest along with them, and all of the characters are distinctive and likeable. The main theme of the book is the impact of chance meetings and extreme choices on the lives of generations...
"More provocative was the erratic process whereby you went in one direction rather than another, did this, not that, lived here, not there, found yourself with this person and not someone else quite unknown, quite inconceivable. How did this come about? Oh, you made choices, but in a way that was sometimes almost subliminal, at others so confused that, in recollection, the area of choice is obscured entirely: what was it that was not chosen? And, sometimes, choice is not an option."
Reading this as a new mother with my own mum staying with me at the time I was also struck by the comment that:
"When Ruth became a mother she had the universal, unexceptional, hackneyed revelation - she perceived her own mother differently."
All in all, the perfect first book for me as a new mother :)
