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Original poster

Please help me find this book I borrowed from the library in 1990!

115 replies

FantasticButtocks · 14/12/2022 18:03

Not much to go on, sorry...
It had a brightish blue cover.
No idea of author or title, but either the husband or the baby was called Stephen/Steven, think it might actually have been the baby. Don't think the marriage was great. The mother suffers with intense loneliness and depression pnd after the birth, husband not very supportive or maybe doesn't understand... but eventually she finds something that interests her, can't remember what, maybe she starts to study, and starts to feel more human again. She starts going out and about with the pram, and also getting into her subject, she sometimes reads on a bench in the park. One day when she's doing this, very absorbed, the unthinkable happens and her child drowns in the pond.
She blames herself. Her husband blames her.

Very grim and sad, I read it when I'd just given birth to my first child Sad
I've looked for it often, without success and I'd be so grateful if anyone recognises it.
Thanks Smile

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Original poster
FantasticButtocks · 16/12/2022 10:09

PermanentTemporary · 16/12/2022 07:43

Blimey fifteenofour that title would be a bit of a plot spoiler in the OPs case.

Intrigued by this but I haven't found anything. It makes me think how few novels survive to be remembered even a decade, a trend made much worse by ebooks.

Yes, true, I think I'd have had an idea what it was going to be about. But I still went and looked it up to make sure...

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Original poster
FantasticButtocks · 16/12/2022 10:07

FurryDandelionSeekingMissile · 16/12/2022 02:16

OP had just had her first baby in 1990 when she read it, fifteen, so it might not be worth going down the YA rabbithole.

I guess that makes OP's baby about 32 now… eek.

Correct, my baby is now 32!

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Original poster
FantasticButtocks · 16/12/2022 10:06

fifteenohfour · 16/12/2022 02:08

Sorry to ask your age but if you have just had your first baby and you read this book in 1990 you must of been very young when you read it? I'm 37 and was 5 in 1990 so are you an older mum? Is it possible it's a young adults novel?

Gosh I thought you'd got it with The Drowned Boy, but no sadly that wasn't it. Thanks for the suggestion.

No I haven't just had my first baby, I'm 58!!
I had just given birth to my first baby in 1990 when I read the book!

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Original poster
FantasticButtocks · 16/12/2022 10:00

Snozzlemaid · 16/12/2022 01:15

Do you have an online library account?
I do, and I can look back at all the books I've borrowed on my account.
I'm sure mine goes back years and years, so might be worth a look if you can.

I don't think 'online' had been invented back then!! Xmas Grin

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RainyReadingDay · 16/12/2022 09:47

Could the author have been Kathleen Conlon? I read one of her novels back in the 80s, My Father's House, which was adapted also for TV then. It was a bit of a misery fest. I didn't read any more of her books but the premise sounds a bit like it could have been one of hers. If so, then they all appear to be out of print now.

PermanentTemporary · 16/12/2022 07:43

Blimey fifteenofour that title would be a bit of a plot spoiler in the OPs case.

Intrigued by this but I haven't found anything. It makes me think how few novels survive to be remembered even a decade, a trend made much worse by ebooks.

FurryDandelionSeekingMissile · 16/12/2022 02:16

OP had just had her first baby in 1990 when she read it, fifteen, so it might not be worth going down the YA rabbithole.

I guess that makes OP's baby about 32 now… eek.

fifteenohfour · 16/12/2022 02:08

Sorry to ask your age but if you have just had your first baby and you read this book in 1990 you must of been very young when you read it? I'm 37 and was 5 in 1990 so are you an older mum? Is it possible it's a young adults novel?

fifteenohfour · 16/12/2022 02:02

www.bibliophilebooks.com/thedrownedboy

Snozzlemaid · 16/12/2022 01:15

Do you have an online library account?
I do, and I can look back at all the books I've borrowed on my account.
I'm sure mine goes back years and years, so might be worth a look if you can.

Yajebbend · 16/12/2022 00:53

Bump so you find your 📕

Original poster
FantasticButtocks · 15/12/2022 23:19

MadameMackenzie · 15/12/2022 22:21

How miserable and depressing

Yes it was. But I'd still like to know what it was that I read.

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MadameMackenzie · 15/12/2022 22:21

How miserable and depressing

BernadetteRostankowskiWolowitz · 15/12/2022 22:19

Dunno but I'm here for the reveal, I want to read it.

Original poster
FantasticButtocks · 15/12/2022 22:19

Is it too ridiculous and far fetched to say that it was Stoke Newington library? Xmas Grin

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Original poster
FantasticButtocks · 15/12/2022 22:18

I so appreciate you all trying to help Smile

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Original poster
FantasticButtocks · 15/12/2022 22:17

Summertimesunshineandfizz · 15/12/2022 22:04

Fay Weldon? Monica Dickens? Beryl Bainbridge?

Meant to say thanks 😊 and I've read all those authors, loved Monica Dickens!

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Original poster
FantasticButtocks · 15/12/2022 22:16

Summertimesunshineandfizz · 15/12/2022 22:04

Fay Weldon? Monica Dickens? Beryl Bainbridge?

Nope. It wasn't someone I've ever heard of iyswim

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Original poster
FantasticButtocks · 15/12/2022 22:16

heldinadream · 15/12/2022 21:59

Anita Brookner was H du L.
Penelope Fitzgerald?

Thanks, no neither of those.

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Original poster
FantasticButtocks · 15/12/2022 22:15

Moonatics · 15/12/2022 21:54

Any more detail?
Like where, by the sea, in a town, out in the sticks, UK USA, Finland, Australia any tiny detail?
I actually recognise this, but it's so long ago and I read so many books back then.

In the U.K. suburbia I think. Or I guess it could have been London or a large town, south east I think...somewhere where going to the park is normal, so not rural, not coastal. I remember not liking the husband, and she wasn't happy, and was overwhelmed by the expectations from him and I think his family, but not sure if that was her perception because of pnd, or whether they actually were overbearing.

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Summertimesunshineandfizz · 15/12/2022 22:04

Fay Weldon? Monica Dickens? Beryl Bainbridge?

heldinadream · 15/12/2022 21:59

Anita Brookner was H du L.
Penelope Fitzgerald?

heldinadream · 15/12/2022 21:56

I thought it might be Margaret Drabble, but I've just had a look and I can't find one of hers with that storyline.
Same kind of ball park as Drabble? A.S. Byatt? Penelope Lively? Woman who wrote Hotel du Lac whose name escapes me at this moment?

Moonatics · 15/12/2022 21:54

Any more detail?
Like where, by the sea, in a town, out in the sticks, UK USA, Finland, Australia any tiny detail?
I actually recognise this, but it's so long ago and I read so many books back then.

Original poster
FantasticButtocks · 15/12/2022 21:51

AnyLightAtTheEnd · 15/12/2022 21:47

I want to read it

It was good.

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