The Heart of Everything is a taut and compelling account of the nature of family relationships and the uneasy grasp of the past over the present. Perfect for fans of Anne Tyler and Maggie O'Farrell.
Mags Jensen begins her day as she always does - with a list. Once it is complete, she lays the table for lunch, spritzes perfume on her wrists and shuts the front door behind her.
That afternoon, her daughter Anita is irritated to discover the house empty. But as afternoon turns to evening, irritation turns to fear, her mother's recent tests for early-stage dementia looming in Anita's mind.
As the hours tick by with no word from Mags, the siblings are summoned home to join the search. Over several days, old tensions rise to the surface, harking back to an earlier tragedy that splintered the family. Powerful revelations take hold between the siblings, and their efforts to find Mags become increasingly frantic, as they are forced to ask: will they ever see their mother again?
Autorentext
Henrietta McKervey is the author of the acclaimed novels What Becomes of Us, The Heart of Everything, Violet Hill and A Talented Man. She has a Hennessy First Fiction Award and won the inaugural UCD Maeve Binchy Travel Award. Her Travel Award project, an exploration of the 31 Sea Areas of the Shipping Forecast, featured on BBC Radio 4. She has programmed the ECHOES festival and International Literature Festival Dublin, and contributes to the Irish Times, Irish Independent, Sunday Independent and the Brendan O'Connor show on RTÉ Radio 1.