Life After Life: The global bestseller, now a major BBC series

Having first read Atkinson's "A God in Ruins', I was tempted to take up the preceding volume, "Life After Life" & I found her at her absolute best, playing with the lives of the Todd family.While in "A God in Ruins ", it was Ted ,a male, the central protagonist, it is Ursulla, his elder sister the heroine of this enthralling book.Atkinson's superb skills as an author is on full display while presenting the various scenarios her characters can undergo alternately with varying consequences & reactions from the readers.For example, Ursulla suffers death in a whole range of ways , from child birth, drowning, suicide, murder etc.While some readers can be put off by this kind of jugglery & uncertainty, I found it exciting that the author is willing to test the limits of our ' willing suspension of disbelief'. She is able to pull off such literary tricks with elan because of her basic strengths as a writer. Her female characters such as Izzie, Sylvie & Pamela are strongly drawn evoking reader empathy. Even the family dogs in an Atkinson novel have character. She is also great in creating the right atmosphere ( you will be dazzled by her ghoulish descriptions of the London Blitz ) As she claims in her Notes after the text, she has indeed succeeded in bringing out the 'Englishness' of her characters ('one does as one must & then has tea' ).This audacious novel drives home beautifully a central philosophical theme , viz,the capricious nature of Fate, which the Todd family psychologist puts across as 'amor fati' (love of fate ).

I spent a long time hunting for this book...and it was totally worth the hunt. It's an amazing premise..what if you got to live your life over and over ..till you got it right. Highly readable..you feel the pain, the angst and the joy of the characters. It will make you think about choices, how one choice, one decision made differently could have lead to a different life. Highly recommend. The book can get a little confusing..but the author has done a brilliant job of making each character someone you believe, want to meet ( or not)...and empathise with..I was sad when the book ended...I wish there had been another window into Ursula's life...after life....

This was my first purchase of Author Kate Atkinson, out of all her books this book steals the attention to bought it first.. hope I read this one soon Thanks for the amazing delivery, never disappoints when it comes to books

No doubt an efficient way to write a novel is to repeat much the same thing chapter by chapter but not exactly the stuff of a page turner.

very good book

Intriguing style of retelling a story as if it happened another way, disconcerting at first, then exciting as you live life again, "Life after Life" as the title suggests. Set against the events of the first half on the twentieth century and the two World Wars. A precursor to her most recent "A God in Ruins". Much recommended introduction to Kate Atkinson for both style and content.

Amazing book, a must read for everyone

Not my kind of book, however, the binding and paper quality is really good. Too much of repetitions and flashbacks makes it a confusing read.