INSTANT #1 BESTSELLER!A brand-new book from the #1 bestselling author of The Break and The Woman Who Stole My Life.They’re a glamorous family, the Caseys. Johnny Casey, his two brothers Ed and Liam, their beautiful, talented wives and all their kids spend a lot of time together–birthday parties, anniversary celebrations, weekends away. And they’re a happy family. Johnny’s wife, Jessie–who has … happy family. Johnny’s wife, Jessie–who has the most money–insists on it.
Under the surface, though, conditions are murkier. While some people clash, other people like each other far too much . . .
Still, everything manages to stay under control–that is, until Ed’s wife, Cara, gets a concussion and can’t keep her thoughts or opinions to herself. One careless remark at Johnny’s birthday party, with the entire family present, and Cara starts spilling all their secrets.
As everything unravels, each of the adults finds themselves wondering if it’s–finally–the time to grow up.
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I always found the author’s books lighthearted, funny and heartwarming with relatable characters and stories. Whether you’re at the beach or in a cosy place, her books are a great escape.
Grown-ups it’s a very long book. It says the story of multiple families with many characters on two or three generations. I must admit that it took me a lot of time to get my head around it because I found it a bit hard at the beginning to keep up with who is who and what they do. After the first half, everything started to come together and I got the hang of it.
The same great writing style and interesting characters overall
It’s been a while since I’ve read a Marian Keyes book and I was less than halfway through this one when I wondered why the hell that was. I adored the fast-paced, conversational style of the story that whips you up into a whirl of intrigue, compassion and amusement, all in equal measure. I had particular feels for the character of Cara and her journey through the hell hole that is bulimia but was completely entranced by the way she didn’t even know that she was in its grips. All of the other characters are just as intriguing, flawed and wonderfully human – I was rooting for every single one of them (except Liam). This book was wonderful and I’m off to read another one. Right now.
I’ve been a huge Marian Keyes fan since her debut novel Watermelon and have read all her books. Most of them are on my shelves.
So happy I listened to the audio of her latest, Grown Ups – for two reasons. One, Marian narrated it and I love her Irish accent, not to mention she can pronounce all the Irish names, places and terms I can’t. And two, it’s very long – over 650 pages!
A huge family saga set over six months, Grown Ups has it all; as I’ve come to expect from Keyes – dysfunctional relationships, addiction, betrayal, divorce, love, lust, grief and loss. It’s exhausting but thoroughly entertaining.
Lots of characters to remember and story threads to follow, so as I said, I’m glad I listened to the audio.
Nobody structures a multi-character story like Marian Keyes. And, as always, she manages to crush me and uplift me all at the same time – while keeping me in stitches.
I m usually a fan of Marian Keyes-but this one was just okay –
A story wrapped around a family of totally dysfunctional people -with on going drama
repeated over and over –
It could have ended half way and I don’t think I’d have missed much –
The single most important theme about the mistreatment of refugees -in Ireland gets somewhat lost amongst this bunch of navel gazing sycophants -and their continuous self aggrandizing nonsense-
Within 24 hours of finishing the book, I missed the characters. I was ready to book a flight to Dublin so I could reconnect with them!
This is one of those books that you race through because it’s so compelling, and then you really miss the characters when you finish it. I absolutely loved this book. It centres around a family of brothers and their wives and children, their lives and lives, their triumphs and disasters. I read it a month ago and I still miss them all. Highly recommended!!
A fabulous, heartbreaking, poignant read about a messy, loud, dysfuncional Irish family – loved it.
A proper family saga, with memorable characters, sparkling plot twists and witty dialogue.
Families are complex and Marion Keyes leave us in no doubt in this new addition to her impressive number of books she’s written. Often funny and sometimes heartrending and poignant, Keyes traces a critical year in the life of one Irish extended family when all the complications and issues that have haunted each of the members come home to roost. She gives each viewpoint such care and depth that there is no trouble feeling compassion and understanding for all of them. Well most all of them. Told with great wit and charm, this has definitely been put on my favorites for the year list.
4.5 Stars for Grown Ups
If you are looking for a hilarious read featuring a quirky, crazy, complex family look no further than Grown Ups, it’s an entertaining, funny read right from the first page.
This lighthearted read features the Casey family and Ms Keyes takes is into all the drama and fun you might expect from an Irish family of three brothers and there assorted marriages and kids.
Johnny, Ed and Liam Casey grew up in a large family and they are all now on a mission to create their large families, throughout this book the banter flows and this family will have you laughing out loud as they deal with breakups, makeups and lots of adorable kids.
Please be warned this is a long read with a million characters, it’s a book you won’t want to put down so maybe set a weekend aside to read it. It’s a fun, entertaining read with the perfect mix of humour, love and drama, it will captivate you from the first page to the last line and I highly recommend it to all romantic comedy lovers.
Marian Keyes is one of my favourite authors so unsurprisingly I adored this book. Keyes creates the most wonderful characters who leap off the page, and Grown-ups has more than most. It’s about marriage and romance and growing-up and settling down, while also touching on important social issues like period poverty and the treatment of asylum seekers. I flew through it and am bereft now it’s over.
Unfortunately I found this book very long winded and a lot of characters and things to keep track of while reading which led me to put it down and pick it up at a later date multiple times to try and get into it as felt it was a bit too much. There were pieces that could have been left out to condense the book down to make for a better read and while a few things like that irked me I did like the characters, they were flawed and vulnerable and the story was good also.
I have loved Marian Keyes’ books from the very first one I read! Grown Ups is no different.
A cute, even funny take on a subject that some might think to be taboo. As expected, the author handled it well, When secrets start to spill, watch out for the ricochets!
Keyes’ characters are enticing, their story deeply involving and keeps you turning pages.
Another great read, I am going to miss this crew – and isn’t that always the sign of a good book?
[Many thanks to Netgalley and the author for the opportunity to read an Advanced Reader Copy of this book. I was not required to write a review. The opinions expressed herein are entirely my own.]
I really enjoyed this book, as I expected I would! Brilliant characters, although there are a lot of them. This isn’t a bad thing though, as their stories are interwoven and the storyline of friendship and family in beautiful settings, makes you want to keep turning page after page. I have recommended this book to so many people.
Thanks to NetGalley and to Penguin UK-Michael Joseph for providing me an ARC copy of this novel that I freely chose to review.
Marian Keyes is a very well-known and popular Irish author, but this is the first novel of hers I read and therefore I can’t compare it to her previous novels. Based on reviews, some readers feel that it is less tight and less funny than some of her other books, but not everybody agrees. I’ll leave it to her fans to make their own minds up.
This novel is the story of a family, well, or of the families of three Irish brothers, John, Ed and Liam Casey, their wives and children. It is a family saga of sorts, although it does not cover several generations of the same family. I must confess that when I read the description I thought this would be the story of what happened when Cara, due to her concussion, started spilling the beans about everything and everybody, and how that would evolve. But Keyes uses that point in the story as the introduction to the characters, and then goes back in time, to a few months earlier, so we learn the reasons behind some of the secrets she reveals, and we also learn a lot about the characters. A lot. This is a very long book, and at first the timeline can seem confusing because of the initial scene, but once we go back in time, the novel progresses in a chronological order (not perfect, because often the characters will remember their past, how the couples met, or details of their previous lives, and those will be interspersed with the actual events), up to the point where it catches up with the birthday celebration dinner for Johnny (quite late in the book), and then moves forward until the end of the novel. We learn about each couple and each individual (at least the adults, not so much the children), although we learn more about the women than about the men: we learn about Jessie’s role in organising family events, inviting everybody and keeping the family together; we read about Cara, who is eminently practical and loves hotels but lacks in confidence in other areas and suffers from a very unhealthy relationship with food (that develops into a full blown bulimia); we read about Nell, the newcomer to the family, an unconventional theatre designer whom everybody loves despite (or perhaps because) of her unique style; and about the brothers: Johnny, who married the widow of his best friend and is at times overwhelmed by his wife’s need to control and organise and by the legacy of her previous marriage; Ed, who is the kindest and more supportive of the three; and Liam, who seems attractive, light and fun to begin with but things aren’t always as they seem. Ferdia, Jessie’s son from her first marriage, is a young man who changes enormously through the novel. Oh, and he is a hunk, as we are reminded quite often.
As you can imagine from the description, the book delves into secrets, family relationships (these three families are very enmeshed and that explains some of the bizarre happenings), the nature of love, trust, confidence, self-worth, how relationships change over the years, there is an important subplot about body image and bulimia (very well done, in my opinion), parenting… There are also funny/dreadful murder-mystery parties, luxury hotels, alternative festivals, romance (with some age difference)… This is not a page turner in the sense of a plot moved by action and suspense. It is more like a soap opera where the lives of the characters ebb and flow, with some peaks of excitement, triumphs and disappointments.
I have mentioned the main characters, although there are many others, including the younger children, friends, work colleagues, staff at the different places where they spend time, collaborators, and although some of the secondary characters are quite memorable, and I didn’t dislike the main characters either (apart from one, but no spoilers), I can’t say I connected with any of them in particular. I liked Nell, Cara (her struggle with bulimia is one of the most realistic and best written parts of the book for me), and Ed, but I didn’t feel personally invested in their stories, although I kept reading, and it’s a long book, so that is saying something.
The story is narrated in the third person from the alternating point of view of the main characters, especially the females, but we also get snippets of what the men think at times. The change in point of view can take place sometimes within the same chapter (several of the characters can meet at an event, for example, and the point of view will then follow someone else), but I didn’t find it confusing, as they are all very different, and we quickly learn to tell them apart.
Keyes writing flows well, and she can easily pass from describing an interior, to making readers share in the state of mind and distress of one of her characters, and although she touches on serious subjects, her writing is not over dramatic or heavy. There are some light scenes, but the book is far from funny overall, although there are moments where the wit of the writer shines through (as I said, some of her habitual readers complained about the novel not being as funny as some of her previous ones, and I wouldn’t recommend it if you’re looking for a laugh-out-loud read). I very much enjoyed the Irish expressions and some of the dialogue sparkled, showing the talent and range of the author. As a little taster, here I leave you with a snippet of a conversation between Jessie and an analyst who is helping her decide how to move her business forward. He is “slightly” creepy.
‘…And the thing is, the thing, Karl that I have just remembered—‘
‘Yeah?’
‘Is that I have a very sexy, non-repulsive husband.’
‘Forty minutes ago you could “never forgive him”.’
‘Time is a great healer.’
The passage is witty but it also illustrates how contradictory we can all be, and there is plenty of that in the novel.
Everything is resolved in the end, and although I think some situations dragged a bit, overall I enjoyed the ending and it fulfilled my expectations.
In sum, this is a book I’d recommend to readers who love stories about big families, especially set in Ireland, who aren’t looking for a lot of laughs, or for diverse characters, and who don’t mind spending a long time with a book. I did wonder if this book wouldn’t have worked better as a collection, with individual volumes being dedicated to each one of the families (I think that at least some of the books, for example the one dedicated to Cara and Ed, would have been stronger), and a tighter edit might also have turned it into a more manageable book for the general public, but I have no doubt that Marian Keyes can write compelling characters, and I’ll check some more of her work in the future. Ah, there are some very mild sex scenes (at least very mild for me, and I don’t like erotica), in case somebody is looking for a totally clean book.
A huge and complex family get together becomes farcical as Cara delivers a few unexpected truths after a bump on the head leaves her unable to hold her tongue, we then get to look back over the previous 6 months at everything that led up to this moment. Another fabulously dysfunctional family epic from Marian Keyes. I loved every minute and didn’t want it to end, the way Keyes can deal with such serious issues with a levity that makes everything seem so honest and real.
Grown Ups Marian Keyes a serendipitous five-star read. This is exactly what we have come to expect from Marian Keyes, light-hearted but with enough heart that you cannot put it down characters that will make you feel like you are one of them. You will be there with them as they live the story. It is a long story, but if you like the author and are in the mood for a long read then you can’t go wrong with this one. I love how Marian Keyes writes dysfunctional families that everyone can relate too, it takes a while to get to grips with so many and such complex characters but once you do it unravels into a compelling and brutally honest story.