Swimming Lessons by Claire Fuller

Oh I just thought this was wonderful - I didn't want it to end. It's one of those books that you just want to be part of, you want to live in their world and live how they live. I guess in this instance it's because all the characters are very free spirited and they all enjoy their lives. I don't want to make out it's a happy book, because it isn't really. A mother has gone missing, feared drowned, so her husband and children have spent 11 years not knowing whether she'll come back into their lives or not. The book has 3 intertwined storylines - the present where it's 2004, the children are grown up and carrying on with their lives, and the father, Gil, has an out-of-control habit of collecting second hand books that have old letters or notes or doodles from past owners in them. The second storyline is from the mother, Ingrid, in 1992 where she is writing letters to an absent Gil, telling him what she and their daughters are doing with their lives, and hiding the letters inside books. The third storyline is also set within the letters - Ingrid is retelling the story from when she and Gil first met in 1976, upto the present. It is mostly through these letters that we learn all the characters, especially that of Gil, and what may have caused Ingrid to disappear.

I loved all the characters, but all in a different way. I thought they were very realistic. I just wanted it to go on and on. I'm definitely going to have to read her first novel 'Our Endless Numbered Days, which won the 2015 Desmond Elliott Prize.

Reservoir 13 by Jon McGregor

While holidaying with her parents in a small riverside village not far from Manchester, a 13-year-old girl, Becky, goes missing. She was last seen by her parents while they were all out walking together. Being a teenager, she was sulkily keeping half a dozen steps behind them, and as they picked up speed, so she slowed down slightly so that when they next turned around to call to her to catch up, she had completely disappeared. She was never seen again.

The police were called, a search was set up, the villagers all volunteered their services to help in the search, a re-enactment of her last days was put together and aired, reporters swamped the village, pleas for information were televised daily. What happened to Becky? Was she murdered? Did she fall? Did she run away? Was she kidnapped?

So begins a tale of how a village and its inhabitants, and the family of the missing girl, all cope as the days, weeks, months, years go by. Life goes on, seasons change, babies are born and grow up, new families move into the area, but still the missing girl is in the back of everyone's minds, and the wonder of whether the truth of what happened to her will ever surface.

I thought this was a remarkable book. The author goes into such detail of daily life, much of which is repeated many times as that is how life is, but the story never becomes boring. You don't mind hearing about the badgers and the foxes and the plants and the changing weather, and the river and the reservoirs - you're hoping that in amongst all this information is a clue as to the whereabouts of the missing girl. I found myself continually on tenterhooks with the expectation of a revelation of what happened. I found myself suspicious of all the villagers - everyone seemed to have something they wanted to hide, some little secret.

Jon McGregor is probably most well known for his award winning novel 'If Nobody Speaks of Remarkable Things'. I hope this will be enjoyed just as much.