Because of You: The beautifully uplifting Richard & Judy bestseller

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Anna has spent years trying to get pregnant and she can’t quite believe that she is finally about to become a mother. It’s impossible to separate a book from the context in which you read it, however, and so picking this up following its listing for this year’s Women’s Prize for Fiction, my hopes were raised to expect something far more literary and original than I suspect the book was even aiming for. At its core, the novel is very much a look at grief, what it means to be a parent, and the bond between mother and child. The premise is an interesting one but we spend far too much time inside the heads of the characters and this really means that the story was actually thin. The intensity of the crisis would be incredibly hard to manage for everyone involved – and especially for Minnie; and to be honest a quick cuppa and apology really don’t cut it.

Not that I really needed an excuse, but the blurb intrigued me and after reading back to back crime titles, as is the norm, it made for a nice change of pace. I did wonder how Hope managed to conceal her daughter from the authorities for so long, yes she moved area’s but even if she didn’t have to take her to the doctors, what about school?

French's writing and storytelling is utterly compelling, it is full of heart, warmth and the kind of heartbreak and sorrow that left me feeling bereft and tearful.

It is entertaining and well produced and you can tell that she reads the text overall with warmth and a smile.The two families’ lives are tracked over time until eventually their worlds collide with startling consequences. The biggest irony here is, I don't think I would've read it at all if it wasn't longlisted for the Women's Prize.

I was really intrigued by the premise and had high hopes but I wasn’t vaguely moved by it, the jokey narrative seemed to jar with the subject matter.The exploration of loss felt no more than a lip service as it seemed like the author wanted to generate warm feelings for Hope in the readers' minds, so she conveniently chose to sideline the grief of Anna. Sal Flint has written and published over 300 chapter books for children and has recently branched out into writing picture books about topics close to her heart, such as dementia and generating kindness. Julius the politician appears to be without a humane bone in his body (I guess Trump proved that is actually possible but it just didn’t stack up with Julius).