Marcella Edwards
Unconventional Unions
The Hand that First Held Mine
By Maggie O’Farrell
Headline Review 352pp £16.99 order from our bookshop
Maggie O’Farrell’s fifth novel, The Hand that First Held Mine, confronts the difficulties and wonders of motherhood. Through the lives of two women, Lexie and Elina, living a generation apart, a story of abandonment and unexpected joy spools out across London.
O’Farrell’s detail is excellent. Each life – Lexie’s in the Fifties and Sixties and Elina’s in the Noughties – is painted as intricately as a miniature. However, while her focus is acute, her chapters are often frustratingly short: for the first half of the book, it’s hard to
Sign Up to our newsletter
Receive free articles, highlights from the archive, news, details of prizes, and much more.@Lit_Review
Follow Literary Review on Twitter
'I gulped down the whole thing in about three blissful hours.'
@WomackPhilip reviews new children's books by @hilary_mckay, @JonathanAStroud, @bookhorse, @conradwrites and Sam Thompson.
https://literaryreview.co.uk/orphans-outlaws
'He consistently fits unreliable "facts" around a specious argument. On practically every page, Husain betrays the Enlightenment principles he so energetically thrusts on others.'
https://literaryreview.co.uk/fear-loathing-in-alum-rock
'Global peace still depends far too much on calm decision-making and displays of good sense by a relatively small number of people with control over the world’s nuclear arsenals.'
@LawDavF on a new book about the Cuban Missile Crisis.
https://literaryreview.co.uk/countdown-to-armageddon