In a Thousand Different Ways: the gripping, unforgettable new novel from the Sunday Times number 1 bestselling author

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Alice Kelly has a gift (or curse, depending on your perspective). She sees an aura around people, sensing their emotions and moods, owing to a condition called synaesthesia. She grows up in an unhappy home with a bipolar mother who neglects Alice and her brothers. This is the story of Alice’s life and ultimately, it’s a rather odd, humdrum and depressing one. Der neueste Roman von Cecilia Ahern ist kein Wohlfühlbuch. Und trotzdem war ich ziemlich gefesselt von Alice' Geschichte. An mehreren Stellen hab ich mitgelitten mit ihr - schlussendlich aber hat Alice ihr Leben ziemlich gut gemeistert. Ein tapferes Mädchen und eine starke Frau. Und jeder neue Abschnitt in ihrem Leben hat sich dann ja auch meistens als Verbesserung herausgestellt. I was immediately drawn to Alice, and I would do anything to protect her. I felt empathy for her in dealing with the gift, and I can’t imagine what it must be like not only to know everyone's feelings, but you could be affected by those feelings too 🥺

The story follows Alice with her gift, and the people in her life – her disturbing and difficult relationship with her Mother and Brother Ollie, her elder Brother Hugh and then later her first boyfriend, husband, children and grandchildren.I found all of the characters well rounded. We get to know them well through their impact on Alice. Her meeting with Naomi is a turning point, where she learns that her life can be different. Her relationship with Andy, after an idyllic start, becomes troubled at times, but they learn to deal with each other's idiosyncrasies. Her love of being out in nature and her growing understanding of plants through seeing their moods and colours was fascinating and and, for her, life-changing. The audiobook narrated by Amy McAllister was good, especially the distinction she provides to different characters. A beautiful cover – very apt for the story. From her extraordinarily difficult childhood, we follow Alice throughout her life, dealing with her strange gift which she cannot describe, therefore nobody can understand, and consequently has her labelled a troublemaker. Relationships with her siblings and her mother are complicated. Her school days are fraught with problems due to her condition preventing her from making friends, until she finds people she can relate to in a special school, just one of many breakthrough moments in the story.

This was my first title by Cecilia Aherne and I was thoroughly engrossed in the story and am now keen to discover more of her writing. I didn’t find those aspects challenging to write. I feel very comfortable writing about people’s foibles – I love to go into the dense dark spaces of the mind and see the world from my character’s eyes. The more nuanced they are, the better. Why do you think you are drawn to writing about loss? We see glimpses of her past, future and present as she goes to a special school, her life after that as she starts to try and discover who she is and meeting people who accept her. Some who even think she is special in ways she doesn't even known.If you asked me to describe this book in a colour, I would call it the blue of a mist - pretty to look at but not very discernable. If you asked me how I felt reading it, I'd say it tugged at my heartstrings but it also left me a bit confused - what was the point? Is it a sort of bildungsroman? Just a story of a woman with Synesthesia? If you asked me whether I would recommend the book to others, I'd say it depends on whether you would like to spend an evening reading about a woman, her struggles with her undiagnosed condition, beautiful relationship with her older brother, complicated relationship with her mother and a romance that just didn't seem right. I haven't read anything by Cecila Ahern for quite some time, but when I saw this on Netgalley, I had to request a copy. Thank you to them and Harper Collins for the ARC in exchange for an honest review. I’ve just begun writing my new novel which will be the 20th novel I publish. Have you ever made a literary pilgrimage?

Once again from the very first chapter, as so often happens in Ahern’s books, you are drawn in from the very start, wanting to know more. The concept of seeing colours to represent emotions is genius, to have the main character be able to see and absorb these feelings and how this insight into others might not be a ‘gift’ is just captivating. On several occasions through the book you could relate to how you really don’t know what is going on with others around you, life seemingly perfect on the outside but possibly something that couldn’t be further from the truth.

Featured Reviews

There are some big leaps forward in time, but for the most part I didn't felt that I needed to know the detail of what had happened in the intervening years. It's only towards the end, when suddenly there are children and grandchildren, that it feels too rushed. In a Thousand Different Ways tells us the story of Alice Kelly who has the gift (even though it doesn't seem that way at times) of being able to see how people around her feel. How wonderful you think. But when you do think about it, it really must be exhausting. Not only does Alice see how people feel but she sees how others soak up others' feelings.