One of my favourite books of the year, and I really didn't expect that based on the blurb or synopsis "55-year-old woman is dumped by husband of thirty years and returns to her childhood home after brief mental breakdown". It felt like there wasn't much original or exciting to look forward to there.

But this book is full of treasures, some of which I don't really want to mention for fear it will spoil the journey. That said, I will mention how the story is told to you like you are an old, close friend of the narrator and she is sharing her deepest and darkest observations, thoughts, memories, learnings, leanings, understandings, witticisms, and love. There is just a lot of love in this book, both for big and little things, and big and little people. Oozing with literary and scientific references and yes, a natural, easy-going but not at all ugly prose - in fact, there is great poetry here - this is a book I am already looking forward to reading again, and I really do not say that about many books. At all. Ever.

Read it with an open mind and an open heart and it will fill both.