REVIEW: This Could Be Us by Clare McGowan

Genre: Fiction | Literary Fiction

Release Date: Expected 1st June 2023

Publisher: Little, Brown Book Group | Corsair 

Kate has done the unthinkable. She'd worked hard to build a perfect life for herself, while ignoring her growing unhappiness. But when her second child was born profoundly disabled, reality hit. Unable to cope, Kate left - disappearing without a trace. She ends up in LA, with a glittering career and a new family of sorts, but the guilt is still suffocating.

Husband Andrew was left to pick up the pieces and care for their disabled daughter and angry, confused son. Bereft and broken, he leaned on Olivia, Kate's best friend. She's been by his side ever since, ignoring her own needs to meet his.

Years later, Andrew has written a memoir about his daughter learning to communicate against all odds. But when Kate's new producer husband decides he wants to make a film of it, their worlds collide once again. Now, Kate must return to the life she abandoned and reckon with what she did. 

"In years to come, when she recognised this party as the last day of her old life, Kate would play a game with herself, trying to count the people who'd been there."

This is a searingly evocative and personal novel about a what family truly means. Now, to quickly preface this the author has addressed that she has loved ones with profound disabilities and this story is an exploration into how people misunderstand and mistreat them, and the complicated way disabled people fit into a world not designed for them. As a disabled person myself, I found this story to deal with some painfully difficult subjects but with tenderness and grace, and I understood the difficulties some people may encounter by loving me, or Kirsty. It was nuanced and delicate, but it definitely hit hard.

Kate was a conflicting and complicated main character — I hated her for abandoning her entire family because she didn’t want to deal with her daughter, but at the same time I deeply felt every emotion she did as she started to realise the magnitude of what she’d done and the guilt and regret started to creep in. There was a strange, unwelcome empathy for her as we look back and see maybe it’s not so simple.  And Andrew resonated deeply with me, someone angry and frustrated who didn’t make good choices but under it all who just wanted to love their child and for the world to see them for themselves, not their disability. Every other character who finds their life changed by Kirsty in different ways, each of them have their own story, their own trajectory that is unfolding.

The story spans two decades, and moves slowly through the years — giving us little moments that individually might seem insignificant but weave together to make a picture of a life, a family. Weaving between their lives before and after, their new and old lives we see what’s changed — and what’s stayed the same. Every person develops and grows as the pages turn, showing us the network of people who get involved and affected by the decisions made years ago.

An extraordinary moving and sweeping story that has the ability to break your heart and build it back piece by piece.

⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐

I was gifted an advanced reviewers copy of this title in return for an honest review. Please check content warnings before reading as this title contains subjects that may be triggering or upsetting.