On a Beautiful Day

3.5 Stars When four friends meet for lunch, they can't know that they will witness an event that is set to change all their lives. Sounds a wee bit melodramatic but that is basically what the book boils down to. Having narrowly avoided being hit by a car whose driver suffers a fatal heart attack at the wheel they each deal with the fall out in their own ways which draws them both closer together and further apart. The real pleasure of the book is in the minutiae of their lives, the daily grind that has to be dealt with no matter whatever else is going on around them: Jo - Newly single after her marriage broke down has just met a lovely man but his teenage daughter is another thing altogether. Is it worth persevering with the relationship in the hope she can make some sort of relationship with an intractable 13 year old? Laura - Desperate for a child and has suffered through a couple of miscarriages and now everything seems to have stagnated - her marriage and her prospects for a family. Eve - Absorbed by her job, controlling of her family (after all a thing can only be done properly if you do it yourself) and worried about her health. Forced to confront her own frailties by a rather New-Age client will this make or break her? India - Hiding a deep dark secret from her past, the fall out from the accident brings it all rushing back to her. Unfulfilled in her choice of career she knows she needs to make a change but can she? The characters are wonderfully complex and at times infuriating and intractable, at others you just wish you had a friend like that. That is the real heart of the book - not their various problems and challenges but their friendship. No matter what these 4 women are an incredible support network for each other and have relationships that any woman would envy. The real issue with the book is the fact that something has to be happening to all of them. None of the 4 are just breezing through the few months described within these pages. There is so much drama for each of them it does become a little trying at times. Yes, we all have those moments in our lives but in any group there is usually at least one person who is coasting along quite nicely whilst everyone else is having a mini-breakdown. The writing is strong and you do get a sense of each woman's voice as they have not been overpowered by the author. I just felt that there was too much going on here with too many issues being covered at once - step-parenthood, mortality, childlessness, divorce, major health issues, teen pregnancy and a few others just for good measure. You do start to feel a little overwhelmed with the sheer depressive nature of modern life at times. Fortunately Ms Diamond does a deft line in humour so you generally get yanked out of it PDQ. Bit of a mish mash of a book if I'm being honest but I did quite enjoy reading it.

Three and a half stars. Four friends meet up for lunch to celebrate one of their birthdays but a near-miss tragedy forces each of them to re-examine their lives and decide what is important because each of their lives is about to change dramatically. Eve, accountant, married mother of two and control freak has found a lump in her breast. Jo, nurse and recently divorced has just met a new man, could he be the one? India, children's music teacher and married mother of three is particularly affected by one of the victims and it brings back memories of her own youth. Laura realises that she is desperate for a baby, she just needs to get her husband on board after their three miscarriages. The ripples from the incident are felt by all four women and when they meet again for the next birthday lunch, none of their lives will be the same. I enjoyed this but I didn't feel any real difference between the women, they all sounded the same and I couldn't really tell them apart. Also, and maybe it's a facet of having four women with very different life issues, it felt as though this was a bit of a shopping list. Divorce? Tick. Baby? Tick. Cancer? Tick. Affair? Tick. Job crisis? Tick. Children problems? Tick. I could go on.

Brilliant book as always