Back When We Were Grown-ups: From the Sunday Times bestselling author of French Braid

I really enjoyed this book as it is written in a way that made me want to find out how and if she does change her life. This book is about the importance of family (your own and extended), emotions, finding yourself and contentment. It is the right length of 274 pages- to find out about Rebecca and her family, the chapters were quite lengthy but each one told a specific part of her journey with enough narrative and detail to keep me interested.

The main character of this book is Rebecca, 53 years old, a widow for 13 years, has 3 stepdaughters, 1 daughter and several grandchildren and Poppy a 99 year old uncle in law who lives with Rebecca in her marital home. She has been wondering what her life would have been like if she had married her college boyfriend and not Joe all those years ago.
Rebecca has a recurring dream where she has a blond son and thinks this could have been her son if she had married Will when she was 19 years old. Whilst still going out with Will, she went to a party by herself and this is where she met Joe (the party was hosted at his house).
Rebecca’s mother was not pleased she had ‘jilted’ Will and got married to Joe so quickly and became a stepmother to his three young daughters. Their mother had moved to London to ‘find herself’.
After Rebecca’s 20th birthday party, a surprise early birthday party hosted by his parents, Joe told his family he wanted to marry her. Joe was persistent and slightly controlling.

Not only does Rebecca want changes to her own life so does her mother who wants to move to a retirement village, this would enable Rebecca to have her mother’s house.

Rebecca did find out where Will lived and arranged to meet him for dinner but he still resented her for leaving him and marrying Joe and then told of it by his mother.
For part of the book she seemed obsessed with how her life could have been different if she had married Will, that is until they went for the meal, she had hoped they could pick up where they left off from all those years ago. We find out Will is a man stuck with routines, is divorced and has a strained relationship with his teenage daughter. I was hoping she would not get back together with Will as he was not the right sort of man for her.

Rebecca and her family also have many routines, but there are based around family traditions- Thursday meals, baby welcome, Thanksgiving, reciting poems or making up rhymes to say at celebrations.

In the book, is Rebecca having time to change or is she beholden to the demands of her family?
When meeting Will and his daughter she agonises over what to wear and ‘which self should she be?’ However the meeting does not go well because of the strained relationship the father and daughter have.
Rebecca says she felt more grown up when she was younger when going out with Will as she seemed to know what she wanted. He reminded her that she wanted ten children, a big jolly crew of children and wanted all these traditions- family rituals, big Xmas, Thanksgiving, but she had forgotten this, but Will comments “Well it seems you ended up with that anyway.”
Is this because she had been swept up in the whirlwind romance and marriage with Joe and forgotten about her wishes when she was younger?

Rebecca appeared giddy when going out on dates with Will, but then ended the relationship as she felt she was still in mourning over the death of Joe. She missed Joe terribly and maybe had not fully got over her grief- maybe she wanted to be going on dates with Joe again not Will who seemed boring and did not complement her personality. She comes across as a caring, family orientated person who is there for everyone else. I think she is going through a depression as she cannot be bothered with her normal daily life anymore. She starts to get better when she is looking after her new grandson and her thoughts change to the present and how she can improve her life itself.

Poppy says on page 252 “There is no true life. Your true life is the one you end up with, whatever it may be. You just do the best you can with what you’ve got.”

What comes across from this book is that you should make the most of your present life and not wonder, what if…