3.5 out of 5 stars

A copy of this was provided free of charge from the publisher in return for an honest review.

To say that Jo and her sister had a difficult relationship with her father would be an understatement. They suffered beatings and oppression. Their brother never had that though and after her father passed away and her brother inherited everything she knew that she had to try and understand why he was this way.

She starts digging back through his past with the intention of putting it into a novel, but for each revelation about her father, she found contradictions in the stories that she would hear from her mother and elsewhere. Discovering the truth will take patience and time but she knows that she will find it.

It would be remiss of me to say that I actually liked this book, nothing to do with the plot of some of the characters or the quality of the writing though. Mostly it was because of the subject matter, male oppression and misogyny and the main character in the book. Baines has made him a really nasty piece of work, especially if you happen to be a female member of his family. For his son and others outside the family, he was considered a warm and generous man, a real contrast. For me, the best part of the plot is the way that Jo, the eldest daughter of this monster, unpicks the layers of secrecy of her father’s life. Baines writes well too, making this a good read. I am glad that I finally got to read it as I need to read outside the comfort zone of my usual genres more often. If you like family sagas with a difference then this might be one for you.

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