Kate Atkinson's Life After Life [SPOILERS]

[JessicaJones]

I got a Kindle for Christmas and went looking for recommendations, found Life After Life and read a sample which set up Ursula as an adult, seemingly killing Hitler and being killed herself. It all seemed interesting and good so I bought it to read. I thought it was going to be similar in plot (if not style) to Edge of Tomorrow where Emily Blunt and Tom Cruise get to live and die again and again til they get their mission right.

I've read the first few chapters and am having to read many different scenes of a young girl dying! Being the parent of 7 and 5-year-old girls I'm finding it quite hard! How many more times do I have to read about the death of a young girl before it settles into the main plot?

(It's possible I'm feeling over-sensitive in that post-Christmas kind of way )

I love Kate Atkinson. I read A God In Ruins (the sort-of sequel) recently and it was quite good. Not as good at Emotionally Weird or Behind The Scenes At The Museum, but pretty good.

I really enjoyed Life After Life, and I'm very easily upset by child deaths in novels, having had a very close call with DS when he was just two weeks old. I wouldn't feel happy reading anything gratuitous, and admit to feeling uncomfortable about a novel I read recently which had the murder of older children at the start.

I think that, on balance, I much preferred A God In Ruins, which follows Ursula's brother Teddy's life. And, no, I don't think what you said was a massive spoiler. It shouldn't spoil anyone's enjoyment of the novel. It is right at the beginning and there's so much more to the novel than that. Hope you really enjoy it as much as I did, OP

I loved this book. Loved it.

Agree that the Fuhrer stuff is right at the beginning. And that it wouldn't be the central premise of the book for me.

Absolutely loved the book, could engage with the characters and it's the only book I want to read again! The death bits wear off after a bit!

I loved Life After Life but I am afraid there is a LOT of dying in the book. WW2 is a major element after all. Some of it v painful to read.

I certainly think it is worth it but it is a bit of a marmite book and I think you have to be in the mood for a book that comes at its narrative obliquely. It's not a traditional structure at all, and if you find that irritating, it may not be for you.

I loved this book, lease keep going.

I really enjoyed this book, and I've just bought the second one (about Ursula's brother) with my Christmas vouchers.

There is a lot in Life After Life that can be upsetting one way or another, so I'm expecting the same from A God In Ruins.

I've also read A Post-Birthday World and enjoyed it very much (except for all the references to snooker loopy, which put a bad song in my head for ages) and in the same style for those who enjoyed it, I can recommend My Real Children by Jo Walton. I've also got (but haven't yet read) The Versions of Us, which is apparently a similar sort of book.

I'd say keep going OP, there's a lot that goes on through the book which hasn't been spoilt by the revelations here.

Love this book too. Took a while to get into but then I couldn't put it down. Agree about some of it difficult reading though, kathysclown I think I know which bit you are referring to.

Got the sequel got Christmas so will be reading that after my current book is finished.

It pairs really well with the Book Thief by the way.