THE SUNDAY LUNCH CLUB by JULIET ASHTON. Meet new friends for lunch! Every few Sundays, Anna and her extended family and friends get together for lunch. One of them prepares the food; than they talk, they laugh and they bicker as only families can. Sitting between her ex-husband and her new lover, Anna is coming to terms with some life-changing news at the age of forty. Also at the table are her ageing grandmother, her fragile sister, her secretive brother, and memories too terrible to contemplate. Until, that is, a letter arrives. Can Anna reconcile her painful past with her uncertain future? And can she keep her family on speaking terms in the meantime? ... Back Cover Blurb Everything - but everything - had changed. ... First Sentence, Prologue Anna needed to get back to Yeti. Did I really just think that? The dog was useless: he was scared of thunder; he hid her shoes when she was about to leave the house; he burrowed between her and Luca at night. Responsibility had bred something else; not love, surely, for the monster shaggy animal that got in her way and shed hair on her furniture. ... Memorable Moment, Page 224 With a glorious, memorable cast of characters, I soon found myself right at home; my place at the Sunday Lunch {Club} set, ready to hear the latest goings on. One of my favourite family based reads of 2022. The story of the Pipers {Anna, her sister, her two brothers, her grandmother ... and lets not forget Yeti}, their partners and the various ex's, new lovers, friends and long lost family members who meet up {almost} every Sunday at a different family member's home. There's bickering, there's disagreements, there's fallings out but, always there for each other when it really matters, they are the kind of family that let's face it many of us dream about. I loved that each chapter was headed by which family member was hosting that particular Sunday Lunch Club and what it was they were serving, that we quickly got to know them; their likes and dislikes, what has been going on in their more often than not chaotic lives, all that kind of thing. Beautifully written, the dialogue flows flawlessly, the family dimensions are depicted perfectly, the conversations and interactions ... Ahh! Lets just say that there were so, so many threads to this story that had me wondering what was going to happen next that I often found myself reading until silly o'clock; so involved that I found myself worrying about/rallying for one or other of the clan throughout, in tears, of both joy and sorrow. A great read that I totally lost myself in, I'm so hoping there'll be invites to further Sunday Lunch Clubs.
