When I was 22 I had lived on my own for four years, and that wasn’t unusual either. The children range from 6/7 years old to 17, and then Neill is 30 and Ferdia is 22 – hardly children. I did get a bit irritated at the constant referral to Nell and Ferdia as ‘young’, grouping them in with the children. The opening chapter is a family gathering with lots of talking and noise and exclaiming from people you don’t know – a few hundred pages later, when it appears again, you are completely immersed and know exactly what the significance of the conversations are.
The shape of the novel is interesting as it starts in the present day, and pings you backwards to a few months before, gradually catching you up and filling in the gaps. I also thought it felt like some of the storylines were a bit rushed. Each couple could have had their own book – it does work with them all in this story, but I did feel slightly disappointed that there doesn’t seem to be a plan to meet them again. Matriarch Jessie burdens them all with her love through extravagant presents and holidays – her five children, husband and extended family consisting of a couple of Johnny’s brothers and various spouses, kids and pets. Grown Ups could easily have been another book series, this time on the Casey family.
She’s done a series of books on the Walsh family, starting with her first in 1995 – Watermelon – which was also turned into a film starring none other than hot from Brookside – Anna Friel.
Her characters are male and female, well drawn and dealing with some pretty non-rosy situations, usually taken from her own experiences. I’ve found that people who haven’t read them have a tendency to dismiss them as ‘chick lit’, but that isn’t the case. I’ve read a few books by Marian Keyes, and enjoyed them all. You know you’re in for a good yarn when the book starts off with a family tree that spreads over two pages.
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