What If?

by Martina Reilly

When Lily Flynn's memory starts to fade, she dusts off the long-forgotten diary she'd kept when she was fifteen and slowly begins to fill in the details of her life.
Five years later, when Lily is admitted to Lakelands Nursing Home, a helper finds the diary and a letter addressed to Lily's daughter Deirdre with instructions that the diary be read aloud to her.
Lily's last wish is that Deirdre learn the truth about her birth so that she might be able to understand her mother's choices all those years ago.
And there begins a journey of three women - Lily, a young woman dreaming of the day she can escape to the city; her daughter Deirdre who has always felt responsible for the life her mother never had; and Zoe, the young helper who reads the diary to Deirdre.
As each woman steps back in time, they realise that while life might turn on a single moment, what happens afterward is up to them.

• ISBN10: 1444725963
• ISBN13: 9781444725964
• Publish Date: 3 January 2013
• Publish Status: Out of Print
• Out of Print: 10 August 2021
• Publish Country: IE
• Imprint: Hachette Books Ireland
• Format: Paperback (UK Trade)
• Pages: 400
• Language: English

Reviews

[Leah]

Martina Reilly is one of my favourite Irish authors around. I adore her books and rank Something Borrowed and A Moment Like Forever among some of my favourite books, ever. I haven’t read a book of hers in a couple of years though, not managing to get around to her release last year, Even Better Than The Real Thing. So when I received a copy of her latest novel, What If, I knew I had to read it. I owed it to myself as I adore her novels, and I adored Martina a review as she so kindly arranged a copy of the book for me.

What If is a very moving, emotional novel. I’ll be honest, I didn’t personally believe it was on par with Something Borrowed or A Moment Like Forever – for me, A Moment Like Forever is Martina’s best book, ever, it utterly blew me away and I still remember the shock and horror when the truth was revealed about Andi’s friend, Lexi. Martina picks her story subjects very well, and in this case, the novel focuses on Lily Deegan, who has begun to suffer from Alzheimers and has been placed in a care home. She has spent her life keeping a diary, and she wants her daughter, Deirdre, to listen to her diary, weekly, and she chooses the entertainment manager, Zoe, to be the one to do the diary reading.

I very much enjoyed the plot of What If, and I found Lily’s diary entries from the 50s and onwards to be quite absorbing, and it was a bit of a wrench to start reading about Lily’s life back then and then be yanked back into the present until the next week. I suppose my problem with the novel was that I just found it a bit slow-moving. It got a lot more exciting towards the end, but the build up to that was quite slow and although I enjoyed the novel overall, it wasn’t what I was expecting. Martina has always written more mature Chick Lit novels (and I don’t mean it that way – that her characters are old ladies, I just mean they deal with proper issues) but this one was a lot more mature, both in terms of characters (except for Zoe) and the topics it dealt with. But, on the plus side, there was loads I liked. Zoe and Dominic, for starters. I loved that. Ronnie, one of the residents at the care home deserved his own novel! I liked how Deirdre got closer to her (or greatcousin?)cousin, Rick who came to look after Lily.

There was a lot to like about the novel. Martina even managed to throw in one last surprise, right at the end there. Which, I admit, (she says smugly) I guessed. It takes a lot to surprise me these days, lemme tell you. I enjoyed What If. All of the characters really made an impact on me, and I admit, I even got a bit teary eyed near to the end (Martina Reilly is the QUEEN of the tear-jerker, I just don’t think anyone can beat her). I definitely recommend the novel, Martina Reilly has definitely matured her novels as they’ve gone on and although it wasn’t 100% to my tastes, I still thoroughly enjoyed it because Martina Reilly knows how to tell a story. I would very much recommend the book, and I look forward to what Martina brings us next, she is truly one of the most talented writers out there.