Jessica's TOP 5 in 2025 | A Family Matter - Claire Lynch

Jessica says... This is a brilliant, beautiful and quietly heartbreaking book, highlighting, in a sensitive and subtle way, important, hidden LGBTQ history. The dual timeline brings perfect poise to the unfolding narrative and reveals the full humanity of the characters. Make sure you read the author's note on the balance of fact and fiction - shocking and comforting in equal measure.

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1982 Dawn is a young wife and mother hemmed in by village life. Then Hazel appears like a torch in the dark.

Their attraction is instant and suddenly Dawn’s world is more joyful, and more complicated, than she ever expected. 2022 Maggie has always lived with an absence where her mother should be. Her father never speaks of her and it feels impossible to ask.

Then an official letter arrives with news from the past, and Maggie must face a truth far bigger than just her family’s secret. At once heart-breaking and hopeful, A Family Matter asks how we might heal from the wounds of the past, and what we might learn from them.