If you were here (by Alice Peterson)

(Amazon UK link)

I have loved all the books I’ve read by Alice Peterson over the past thirteen years or so. The author was struck with a debilitating illness that changed the course of her life in her late teens, and her books reflect that. The characters in her novels often deal with disabilities and chronic illness. ‘If You Were Me’ is no exception.

The book is narrated alternatively by Peggy - an independent and often lonely woman in her late 70s and Flo, Peggy’s granddaughter, who is in her late 20s. We learn right at the start of the book that Peggy’s husband Tim died in his mid-fifties with Huntington’s Disease, and their daughter Beth - Flo’s mother - also died, in her early fifties, from a tragic accident.

Huntington’s Disease, which I knew nothing about, is a genetic condition. The children of those who have it have a 50% chance of developing the condition themselves. Peggy learns, in a prologue at the start of the book, that her daughter Beth had taken a blood test which determined that she did have the disease. But she had never discussed it with Peggy, nor had she mentioned it to her daughter.

So Flo, at the start of the book, has no idea that there’s an even chance that she might have this condition. She doesn’t know that her mother had it, and she doesn’t know the name of the illness that disabled and then killed her grandfather. She’s just got engaged to a man called Theo who is working in New York, and is about to go and join him for a year.

Peggy has prevaricated for five years, knowing that she must tell Flo some time about this condition, but unwilling to tell her something so devastating. But now, with Flo thinking about getting married and possibly having children of her own, Peggy knows that the time has come…

It’s almost entirely a character-based story, full of poignancy and with a pace that left it almost impossible to put down. It’s not a short book - around 450 pages in paperback - but I finished it in just a couple of days. There are some ‘educational’ parts, about Huntington Disease, but they’re so well done, in discussion with professionals, that I didn’t find them intrusive at all.

I liked Peggy very much, although I didn’t find Flo so easy to relate to. However I did like her best friends, the sister and brother Maddie and James. Flo is James’ flatmate, but they’ve always treated each other as brother and sister. James has been involved with a woman called Emma for several years, and Flo has been with Theo for eighteen months.

There’s a fair amount of switching between past and present, again done cleverly as Flo starts to read her mother’s diaries. She learns a great deal, feels closer to her mother, and also feels more enabled to make a decision about whether or not she will take a test to find out if she has the faulty gene.

The book takes place over the course of a year, excluding the prologue which is five years earlier, and there’s significant growth and healing for several of the main characters. There are no ‘bad’ guys - just the disease, causing immense conflict as people learn about it. There’s a great deal of emotion, and I found myself on tenterhooks, wondering just what else might happen, and how people would deal with it.

I was glad that the book ended the way it did, with two people finally getting together; I had seen it coming for most of the book, but the tension and uncertainty is extremely well done. Not all the questions are resolved; one important issue is left for the readers to make up their own minds. But that’s okay. It’s a story of determination, demonstrating the importance of family ties and supportive friendship, and is one of the best books I have read in a long time.

It’s likely to appeal more to women than to men, but anyone wanting to know more about Huntington’s Disease would also probably find this very enlightening. Also very highly recommended to anyone who likes thoughtful women’s fiction.

Review copyright 2020 Sue's Book Reviews