I enjoyed this book immensely and am sure it will sell well. However I found the overall tone of the novel hard to place. I really felt like the main character was based on Mz. Keyes herself, which is not a bad thing but I think (somewhat ironically) it made Amy rather two-dimensional. Even her 'flaws' were largely perceived as positives by those around her and her narration was glib, making it hard to sympathise. I also felt there were just too many characters featured that didn't add anything to the plot. The backstory with Sofie/Urzela, Neeve's father, Tim at work, Matthew and Dante - they added unnecessary saturation to an already over-crowded narrative. Alzheimers, abortion, step-families, marital affairs; all of these are huge topics and I think by trying to address them all in one book, Keyes was setting herself up for failure. There's a sudden chapter on abortion that completely blindsided me and felt like it belonged in a different novel. I think it would be fair to say this novel would have really benefited from more ardent editing and if Keyes weren't such a well-known name it probably would have received it. It's funny but confused.

Marian Keyes at her best, The Break will make you laugh and cry and its oh so thought provoking. Her characters are so real life, people we know with the same life stories. I didn't want to put it down.

My first marian Keyes title and I will defintley be reading more. Well drawn characters and the story had a satisfying ending. If you enjoy contemporary family stories , that move along then you will enjoy this. Not an action packed thriller, but then i don't like those, But avery beleivable story of real life.

A funny and quick read! Perfect for the holidays! Finished it in one go and found it hilarious!

I loved this book,it's sad,but funny in places,very well written,this is the time when you need your family and friends, must read.

I absolutely loved this book. It grabbed my attention from the very first line and had me snorting with laughter over one-liners straight away. I really didn't want to put it down as I couldn't wait to find out what happened next. I love Irish humour anyway, being of Irish descent myself, so could just imagine everyone saying what they did.

The main character, Amy, is part of a large Irish family and whilst you think you'll never figure out all the complicated relationships (she has a daughter from a first marriage, a daughter from a second marriage and a 'daughter' that is actually her brother's daughter) it actually all falls into place as you go along. Amy is married to Hugh, who has decided that he needs 'a break' for six months, so he books his flight and off he jets to Thailand. It's a complete break, as if they weren't married, so other relationships, if they happen, are allowed. It's a complete shock to poor Amy, although as the book progresses and she reflects on other events she can see where it all started unravelling.

So Amy is left with the fallout, children (albeit older children), family, friends, some so-called 'friends', running around after everyone as usual, until she starts to try and enjoy herself too and move on with her life, as she never expects Hugh to come back.

It's a complete roller-coaster of a ride, and so entertaining. It's one of those books you want to read just one more chapter to see what's happening next. The cast of characters is so wonderful, such diverse personalities. I loved Amy's Mum who looks after her Dad (also sadly hilarious as he shouts all the time and can't remember who anyone is and why they're in his house half the time) who has Alzheimer's, and starts to spread her wings and act like a youngster and actually becomes a bit of a mini-celebrity for a while through one of her granddaughter's internet blogs.

What I also loved is you never quite knew what was going to happen next, or where it was all going to end up, right to the very end. You knew you should really hate Hugh for doing what he did, but he was actually a really lovely guy who made a really stupid mistake.

Absolutely wonderful story-telling, hilarious and sad, and utterly unputdownable!

Oh how I adore Marian Keyes. This book delivers her usual wit and wisdom. We follow the life of Amy and her experiences after her idiot (my opinion) husband takes a break from their marriage and family. She puts the reader in Amy's position so thoroughly that my heart broke along with Amy's. Amy and her family and friends are so alive to me that I miss them now I've finished reading.

Like all of her other books - just bloody loved, loved, loved this one. Another 5*

Firstly, I love, love, love Marian Keyes but I wasn't at all sure I was going to love this book. As a married woman with two children the whole premise of a husband deciding he needed to take a 'break' from his children, responsibilities and marriage for 6 months and then he'd be back filled me with, I'm not gonna lie, horror. To Amy my thoughts were along the lines of ... why would you do that to yourself? And to Hugh ... you don't get to walk away from life, grow a pair and get your head back in the game. So, this was how I started The Break, and granted I stayed that way for sometime, but somewhere along the line I got drawn in and found myself hanging on every word.

Marian Keyes has always been able to spin a great yarn and The Break is no different, the writing is warm, charming, sometimes desperately sad and often funny, funny, funny. The characters are absolutely technicolour and I'm really gonna miss them. This is one of those books that you can't put down until you've finished but then feel bereft because you have. It's a quirky celebration of relationships and human flaws. 'Life is all about the grey'.

A wholehearted thank-you to Netgalley for providing an advance copy in exchange for an honest review, I loved this book.

Hugh and Amy seem to have a solid relationship. With three children to look after life is busy. Hugh's father dies and he is devastated. Then a close friend dies and he realises he needs to get completely away for six months. Amy lets him go but is shattered by his decision. However, two years previously, Amy had developed a serious crush on someone she met through work and once Hugh leaves this crush leads to something more serious. Life with all the ups and downs goes on and suddenly Hugh returns earlier than expected. Will they be able to pick up the pieces of their marriage or will the split become permanent.
This is a beautifully written book which will make you laugh and cry and want to finish the book to find out what happend but then be disappointed that the story is over

I adore everything ever written by Marian Keyes. This book has got to be up there as one of my favourites. I laughed, I loved, I cried and got angry at different stages of this emotional roller-coaster of a book. Marian really know how to write such believable likeable and somewhat unconventional characters. You just get to know them as if they are real people. This will be one for the favourites pile.

I love Marian Keyes. She seems like the loveliest, funniest person. And I used to adore everything wrote. But as we have both grown older, we have unfortunately grown apart in relation to books.

I did enjoy a couple of the secondary characters – Alistair and Amy’s mother especially.

But “The Break” was a bit slow-moving and I was definitely left waiting for something big to occur. It was a struggle to finish and I was just dissatisfied overall.

'Myself and Hugh . . . We're taking a break.'
'A city-with-fancy-food sort of break?'

If only. Amy's husband Hugh says he isn't leaving her. He still loves her, he's just taking a break - from their marriage, their children and, most of all, from their life together. Six months to lose himself in south-east Asia. And there is nothing Amy can say or do about it. Yes, it's a mid-life crisis, but let's be clear: a break isn't a break up - yet . . . However, for Amy it's enough to send her - along with her extended family of gossips, misfits and troublemakers - teetering over the edge. For a lot can happen in six-months. When Hugh returns if he returns, will he be the same man she married? And will Amy be the same woman? Because if Hugh is on a break from their marriage, then isn't she?

What I thought

I happily admit I'm biased when it comes to Marian Keyes because while her writing invariably involves a romance, she primarily writes around the effects of depression, sadness, mental illness and ways of coping with life. Grief, breakups, death, drug addiction, and unplanned pregnancies have featured along the way and have made her much more than a cliche genre author.

In The Break, a single event with a pretty obvious bad guy (the husband for leaving) is traced back over time to the origins of the relationship and what really took place in the dynamics of the family.

Keyes' writing skills are excellent and, no matter the topic, she consistently shows and doesn't tell while sustaining more than one -or two- narratives and storylines.

This is a great read.

The Break by Marian Keyes is published on 7 September.

Amy's husband Hugh has decided he needs a "break" from their marriage, after the grief of bereavement has tipped him squarely into a mid-life crisis. Amy hasn't had time for a mid-life crisis, with three young people to look after, parents who in their differing ways drive her up the wall, and a satisfying but financially precarious job in a PR partnership.
The dilemma of this novel is: how will Amy cope with the pause in her relationship with Hugh; will Hugh come back; will things ever be the same again; and what other events helped trigger this rift in the first place?
As ever, Marian Keyes delights us with her insights into how her main character thinks, and how life goes on in its inevitable fits and starts in a big family full of unconventional characters. I love Marian's novels because, although they're funny and easy to devour in a few days, she tackles serious subjects with fearless honesty and necessary anger. In this book her characters are forced to deal with the one issue that is holding Ireland back from being a participant in modern Europe, an issue which the Irish government needs to tackle without further delay - and the way she writes about this is both harrowing and inspiring.
Once again Marian has produced a glorious book that I will certainly be reading again one day.

Amy's devastated when husband Hugh announces he needs a 'break' from his marriage to 'find himself' in Thailand. Trying to keep the rest of her large family together while spotting Facebook pictures of him in bed with his holiday romances, Amy counts down the days to his return while thinking back over last year she realises she's not as blameless as she thinks. Entertaining romance from Marion Keyes, fans will recognise the extended family interfering with her attempts to live her life the way she wants to. Not one of her best but a good holiday read.

Sadly Marian Keyes seems to have lost her edge. From an author that once mixed her own brand of biting humour with a sensitive take on the darkest of topics (domestic violence, rape, drug abuse, etc), an a class above the usual chick lit novels, this is a let down. It's a fun, comfy read, but it seems like Keyes has lost her unique voice somewhere along the way, as this book doesn't stand out from all the other romantic books on the shelf.

The humour was sorely lacking, as was the depth and character development. If she was hoping to create another family like the Walshes then she has sadly failed. They didn't have enough interesting personality to make me want to find out more or read a book from their perspective. The darkness and black humour that has also been an essential part of Keyes' writing is also absent.

It feels rushed, especially the ending, which was a real disappointment, and full of cliches. It feels like Keyes is going down the Stephen King route of churning out book after book to meet public demand. Maybe returning to the Walsh family is what is needed here.

Marian Keyes is one of my favourite authors and I was very excited to read The Break.

Amy and Hugh are the perfect couple living a very hectic but ordinary life. It comes as a great shock to everyone when Hugh announces he is taking a six month break from their marriage to travel and experience life as a middle aged bachelor. Although he tries desperately to reassure everyone, especially Amy, that he will return and he loves them dearly, things aren't quite so easy.

Needless to say life is messy and emotional at the best of times. Seeing photos on Facebook of Hughes adventures and conquests forces Amy to question her feelings for Hugh, past relationships and what she wants for herself in the future. Amy has to deal with numerous challenges with family ill health, teenage pregnancy, finding out who her true friends are and infidelity.

The book is filled with heartbreak, laughter, fear, jealousy, lust and love making for a believable story which could happen in any family. Another brilliant book to add to my collection.

It was a mistake to choose this book as it's not for me. I couldn't like the heroine or care whether or not her husband came back to her. I also found it boring and padded out with unnecssary detail. Not the sort of review I usually write but having now read two of her books, I think Marian Keyes very overrated.

So fecking funny! As Irish as a good craic, bubbling under with a piss take of celebrity culture, a lovely warm look at a 21st century family and a damn near brutal window into family, marriage, colleagues and friend relationships.

Amy is our vintage vixen. A cross between bumbling Bridget Jones and the loveable Lorelai Gilmore, Amy is a career mum and dedicated wife. Or is she?

And then her husband decides to go off and "self actuate" for six months.

What a bastard! Or is he?

Marian Keyes takes her reader on a hilarious and sometimes tragic journey through Amy's daily life choices whilst Hugh the husband is away. Concurrently, the reader is treated to a little bit of 'flashbackery' so we can start to sense that all may not be quite what it seems.

A kaleidoscope of rich characters - a rebel grandmother baulking at caring for her dementia ridden husband, Neeve the insecure daughter who sees life through her beauty vlog and Steevie her AMAB girlfriend to name a few. Then there's the cosmopolitan work trips to awards ceremonies and flashy hotels, indeed, never a dull moment. As Amy is a Publicist I can see the temptation for the indepth profiling of Amy's celebrity clients by Keyes, but they were superfluous to reading requirement for me personally. What I did enjoy was the family dynamics and "watching" Amy bumble through her six months of change. It was a bit cringey having to watch our Amy making some choices that from a distance, were downright regrettable, but that's life isn't it. These choices however, were portrayed with flair and elegance by Keyes.

Our lovely author has thrown us a pick 'n' mix of themes: trust, adultery, abandonment, ageism, abortion, sexism, and love.

A great uplifting read, a true 5 star recommended book. Thanks to NetGalley and Penguin for my free ARC. You are going to love this ...

Published on 7th September 2017, posting review to www.appletreeantiquarianbooks.wordpress.com on 1st September 2017.

The Break doesn’t shy away from the big topics. As well as the issues of relationships and how they change over the years, Keyes also makes reference to the 8th amendment. It’s handled in depth and in a wonderfully human way. There’s no dramatics, no shouting wildly about a message. However, it will hopefully open the eyes of her broader world audience to the situation as it is in Ireland currently, and will hopefully grab the attention of readers who may be on the fence. It’s not preachy or over the top, but it gets the message across.

Neither Amy nor Hugh are perfect characters. Both go through phases where you’re shouting at them to dump the other, run off and join the circus. It’s true to life in that way. We’re all not 100% the people we really should be all of the time. The realistic portrayal of how it affects everyone else, how others react to the news and events going forward is refreshing. These characters are full-bodied and personable. It felt like I was sitting down with Amy for a cup of tea and a catch up at times, reading the chapters. The depiction of their relationship, the little issues that come up – it will speak to others who have been, and who are, in those shoes. The anticipation as to how it would all work out kept me turning the pages furiously. There’s a lot in there to unpack.

Aside from the main characters; The Break is host to a cast of side characters who serve a purpose and are truly memorable. I love Alastair, he’s the work mate everyone should have. Her children, her “very modern” family, the interactions with her sisters – all of these things make up an environment which feels like you can just walk in and be a part of. Things like the reality of dealing with parents with worsening health and how the burden is spread among siblings – these are real issues, prevalent in so many families, and while not a focus, it’s a very real representation of what life in so many homes is like.

It’s difficult to do as in depth a review as I would like without any spoilers. However, to do so would be unfair to the reader. Instead, I will just recommend to you to pick up this book, make some time. Stick on the kettle, tell the kids to fend for themselves and get stuck in – you won’t regret it.