Expectation: The most razor-sharp and heartbreaking novel of the year

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Nathan reached a breaking point and told Hannah that he loved her but he just couldn’t do the IVF treatments any longer. However, the outside would casually remark that they do have it all-the house, the job, the freedom, the child, the ability to try or give up on IVF, all this is a luxury fought for by our feminist forerunners. I picked up this book after it was recommended on the podcast The High Low and was immediately hooked. Am Ende passt der deutsche Titel dann aber doch sehr gut, denn der Roman ist "Was wir sind" - voller Hoffnungen, voller Ziele, voller Pläne, aber eben auch voller Enttäuschungen, voller Rückschläge und voller unerfüllter Erwartungen.

The ending brought it back around a little bit but the detour made me lose my interest and it was hard to get back. Devastatingly perceptive and emotionally wise, Expectation deserves to feature on many a book prize shortlist this year. I worked briefly as an actress for a few years (and still sometimes hanker after performing), I’m now a playwright, theatre fan and book obsessive who is particularly fond of reading novels that span a number of years and follow characters through their lifetimes, all the better if they’re chock full of relatable female characters.

The weight of societal expectations has these women caught in a loop of success, fertility and motherhood. Moving, elegant and with a lot to say about the lives of modern women with a firmly London centric sense of place, this is not to be missed. I can see how some have made comparisons to Sally Rooney, but I think Hope's writing is less crisp and insular, and more expansive. As the years in which she might conceivably conceive have diminished, she has felt a corresponding, surprising sadness rise.

Each of the characters resonated with me and I’m in awe of the way Anna Hope captures what it means to be a woman, right here, right now, with all the precision of a surgeon’s knife.Wir sind umgeben von Erwartungshaltungen, manche erfüllen wir, anderen werden wir nicht gerecht und können das auch gar nicht. The characters are well-described and the situations that they find themselves in are convincingly portrayed and I would have liked to have learnt more about each of the women and also more about the supporting characters - particularly Lissa’s mother who seemed to have lived a full and interesting life; I also would have liked to have read a little more about some of the peripheral characters, such as the young woman Cate met at a playgroup who was in a same sex relationship and who helped Cate to see things in a different light.

These three are bound together in friendship, meeting regularly, sometimes sharing problems, sometimes donning a brave face and sometimes looking enviously at each others’ lives. So Hope is saying that two women in their late twenties, who are both with partners about five or six years, move into a house-share instead? The 103 third parties who use cookies on this service do so for their purposes of displaying and measuring personalized ads, generating audience insights, and developing and improving products. There is, of course, more - but to reveal more would spoil the story for those who have yet to read the book. A ‘What they did next’ story of characters from a Sally Rooney novel’ SARAH FRANKLIN’The story of 3 college friends, if you’re a fan of Sally Rooney, you’ll love EXPECTATION’ IRISH EXAMINER’A must-read’ FABULOUS MAGAZINE’A generation-defining book on motherhood, ambition and sex.

This is hugely readable: perfect for sticking in your bag for a plane ride, a sit on a beach, or your daily commute. Lissa, a beautiful but failed jobbing actress, struggles to earn enough money to live on and despite attracting plenty of male attention, she finds it difficult to form lasting relationships. Cate, who was once in love with activist, Lucy, is now married to Sam and struggling with new motherhood. There was something comforting about the story meandering through places I’m familiar with especially because the 3 characters’ emotions, life choices and realisations were often so difficult and you as the reader could feel their vulnerability.