The Age of Misadventure by Judy LeighMy rating: 3 of 5 stars
Georgie is a divorced Liverpudlian single mother, a beautician whose business is in her house. Her daughter Jade is 24 years old and runs a personal fitness business from the basement. Georgie's younger sister Bonnie is married to slimy cheater called Adie, Georgie has tried to get Bonnie to leave him time and again but Bonnie loves him and believes him when he says he loves her. Added to the mix is Georgie and Bonnie's Aunt Anne, known always as Nan or Nanny.
When one of Adie's shady business deals goes wrong Bonnie and Georgie are threatened by a shady gangster so Georgie comes up with a plan to hide from Adie and his business associates by spending a few weeks in Brighton where Jade's new boyfriend, a Spanish footballer called Luis, lives. But travelling with your aunt, your sister and your daughter isn't always the Thelma and Louise road-trip it's cracked up to be. What with the moaning, the constant toilet stops, the sobbing and the sulking. Rather than bring the family back together enforced proximity seems more likely to drive them further apart. Until Adie's associates find them.
I have to be honest, I can't think of four more unpleasant women in one book who weren't serial killers. Bonnie is totally self-obsessed, a grown woman does not make a single cup of tea or coffee, or make dinner for any of the others for weeks and weeks. It all falls on Georgie. Despite being told by Georgie not to use credit cards so that Adie can't trace them Bonnie frequently goes out shopping buying make-up and other essentials. She also blithely tells Adie where they are hiding. Jade is 24 going on 13, I don't think I have ever wanted to reach into my Kindle and slap someone quite as much as I wanted to slap Jade for her constant criticism and moaning and blaming everything on her mother. Goodness only knows what a sweet man like Luis saw in her! Georgie is a 55 year old doormat, scurrying around trying to placate everyone and waiting on them all hand and foot. Then when she meets a man it's instalurve and she starts acting like a teenager, sneaking out and lying about where she's going. Finally Nan, her biggest problem was that she was clearly intended to be the comedy character but her constant malapropisms were wearing.
Overall, the plot was quite good, I liked the pace and the writing was good, although a little too much "I ..., I ..., I ..." for my taste but sadly the characters all seemed a bit two dimensional.
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