As grounded in thought as Marvellous is in the wild and manmade worlds around her, Winman’s book accepts the grave realities of life but refuses to accept them as the be-all and end-all. Well, interesting – as a child, I hated reading! Well, ‘hated’, that’s a very strong word. No, it wasn’t really a part of my life, I am not a natural reader, that’s what I tell myself. It wasn’t really something that bedded down very early. Now I always have to add this as a caveat, because it drives my mum bananas: she did read to me as a child, and my father did. They bought me books, they took me to libraries, I couldn’t sit still! My imagination wasn’t one that was ignited by words, it was very much ignited by images, and me being out and about. So I don’t have one, but I do remember three books: Flat Stanley, Stig of the Dump, Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, they were the three books that I do remember. And then I went out duly and imitated those lives out in the recreation ground. Nor that pain, suffering, broken hearts and bodies can be ignored simply by the power of positive thinking. What do you think about the relationship between Francis and Marvellous? Memory is a central theme in the book – do you think it was presented as something that is reliable? How did you feel about the element of magic in the book – did it intrigue you or turn you off?

A book to savour, to read in wonderful, rich little bits like dark chocolate. Winman's prose is poetry, with a rhythm, a heartbeat, that carries you through like music -- Emma Hooper, author of ETTA AND OTTO AND RUSSELL AND JAMES The central character is, of course, Marvellous herself whose radical perspective frequently disarmed me. She’s someone who prizes the stripped-down simplicity of the world over heedless progress: “Some things are best left untouched, she said. Tides rise and tides fall. That is perfection enough.” She communes with inanimate objects which sounds fanciful but comes across as a deep, meaningful conversation she’s having with herself more than the world around her. Over the course of the novel, we learn about the three great loves of her life. Her first lover was a woman, but rather than dwelling upon trying to define sexuality its refreshing how she moves from that to relationships with men without ponderous reflection or attributing any meaning to it. She’s also someone dealing with dementia and her struggle with the loss of memory is meaningfully related. What is so appealing about A Year of Marvellous Ways in that in its pursuit of magical joy and hope, again expressed in ways so lyrical your heart will dance as you read, it doesn’t pretend that everything will be all right as some kind of foregone conclusion. It’s Good Friday and the start of a four day weekend so there’s no excuse not to snuggle up with a cup of tea and a good book. The latest Book Club review comes once again from Emma Kingston from Year of the Yes.Both Marvellous and Francis have tales of love and loss to tell, though their lives were seemingly worlds apart. An array of entrancing stories from them both are littered throughout, but they are perfectly knitted together – during the course of which dreams are shattered, realities made and magic happens. A Year of Marvellous Ways by Sarah Winman, author When God Was a Rabbit, is such a book, richly told in ways so breathtakingly heartfelt and lovely that you wish you could stay in its richly-wrought world, communing with its quirky but thoughtfully intense characters forever. Probably that everybody has a story, you know, and people who are invisible in the world have an equal story to us, maybe a little bit more extraordinary at times. But everybody deserves to be listened to, and deserves to be seen. I suppose we’re entering a phase in society where a lot of people are invisible today, and I hope it’s a story that makes one section of society a little bit more visible.

Waiting is what 89-year old Marvellous spends the year 1947 doing, in an isolated Cornish hamlet, although she isn’t sure what she is waiting for. This might seem like a less-than-engaging narrative device, but Sarah Winman creates gripping suspense while unfolding Marvellous’s memories, from lonely nights spent “willing her life to change” to the time “Whatshisname” was lured in her direction by a Louis Armstrong song playing on the wireless. Paths cross in unexpected ways in this pacey plot. An unlikely friendship develops at the core of the compelling tale when Marvellous meets a troubled young soldier, Drake. Storytelling rejuvenates Drake: as Marvellous shares stories of her life resonating with the transcendent power of love, Drake learns how to marvel at life again, seeing the extraordinary in the ordinary. “Everyone had a limit,” writes Winman, engrossingly showing characters pushed past their breaking point. The novel’s surprising denouement is also well worth the wait. . At a recent event Sarah Winman proclaimed, “I’m not interested in the probable, only the possible.” That is particularly apparent in Marvellous’ story. She is a remarkable character and woven throughout her narrative are elements of fantasy and wonder. It truly indulges your imagination. But it requires you to come to the book as a non-skeptical reader, to suspend belief or judgment and just be open to simply embrace beautiful storytelling. There are a host of other characters who come in and out of the lives of these three main characters, all of whom are wounded or lost in some way. A gripping waiting game ... The novel's surprising denouement is also well worth the wait * Observer *A glorious poem of a novel - a story to read slowly and to marvel at the beauty of it -- Rosamund Lupton, author of SISTER