Review: Characters that feel real
Rating: 4 out of 5
Date: 01 14, 2014
Three friends are on the verge of adulthood. Aidan thinks life’s great because every girl he meets finds him attractive; his school friend, Seth lacks confidence, but maybe he’ll find happiness when his dream girl eventually notices him; Livy longs for Seth to pay attention to her rather than her sister. Where will the next decades take them?We follow Aidan, Seth and Livy from the nineteen-eighties into the noughties, seeing how successfully, or otherwise, they cope with adult life. Their personal and professional lives hit highs and lows, and their relationships ebb and flow.These characters feel real. They muck up, they drift, they have dreams. As the years roll by they change, and in response I found my feelings towards them altering too. Take the two male leads, for example. Initially I disliked Aidan, believing he was a selfish two-dimensional character, but later he revealed depth and sensitivity that made me warm to him. In the early chapters my heart went out to Seth; such a sensitive, misunderstood soul, but later I wavered between sympathy and irritation and back again – many times. Both men stayed in my mind long after I’d finished reading.Each new chapter moves the story on a few years. On occasion I found the jumps in time a little disorientating because I felt momentarily distanced from the characters. However, I soon connected with them again and this was helped by the author’s skill at providing cultural markers, such as British fashion and music, to show the passing years.A debut novel that captures the experience of contemporary life.