I kept listening not so much for what happened next, but to see if anything happened at all. However, I lamented the lack of any coherent plot - I love a good plot, unashamedly. I enjoyed various scenes throughout as well as links to characters and events in the companion book, Life After Life. The way Kate Atkinson builds up characters in this book is incredibly good, you get a real sense of who everyone is and why. Alex Jennings is one of my favourite narrators and has done a wonderful job of bringing this book to life.

Kate Atkinson is a fine, imaginative writer and has has maintained her high standards in this book. I think it would have been helpful to have this at the beginning of the recording. There is a long epilogue to the book in which the author explains her approach to the novel and how it dovetails with Life after Life. These are emotionally draining scenes which are, thankfully, counterpointed by some lighter scenes. Much time is spent with the bomber pilots during the second world war: their heroism is well-known but the book really brought home to me the horrors they endured. I was drawn into the lives of the main characters as the narrative time-travelled back and forth over the 20th century and into the 21st.

It took me awhile to get into this book as the first few chapters dot about among different characters whom I needed to get to know or be reacquainted with those who figured in the author’s previous book Life after Life, but soon I was utterly riveted by this powerful and memorable novel.

A god in ruins novel