I should have noticed that this was the second book in a series. Between trying to catch up with the characters back stories and reading something outside of the typical genre I read it took me sometime to get into the flow of the story. However once I got comfortable with the style I began to really enjoy the story.

I’m sure I would have enjoyed it more if I had read the books in the correct order but it was worth persevering with.

unfortunately, like many other readers, I hadn't realised this was the second book in a trilogy and really struggled with the characters and their backstories. As ever with this author it was beautifully written, but sadly I found it too difficult to follow. I hope in the future to start from the beginning of the first book as I'm sure there are wonderful stories to discover. Feels unfair to rate it too low

The premise of the book is great and the author really delivers. Great read. Highly recommended. .

It has taken me a long time to read and review this book as I wanted to read the first book, The Dust That Falls From Dreams, before reading this one. I wouldn't have been able to follow this lovely book if I hadn't made that decision. A great follow up, some wonderful characters revisited and some emotional scenarios. A great read. With thanks to NetGalley and the publishers for the opportunity to read and review and e_ARC of this book. But please please please indicate whether the offered books are part of a series so we can decide whether to request the title.

Oh dear - my fault probably because I hadn't realised this was second in a series. I haven't read the first one and it does not work as a standalone. I had no idea who anybody was or what was happening and there was a LOT. Probably an excellent read if you're not an idiot like me, but I'm afraid I DNF.

I am in charge of our Senior School library and am looking for a diverse array of new books to furnish their shelves with and inspire our young people to read a wider and more diverse range of books as they move through the senior school. It is hard sometimes to find books that will grab the attention of young people as their time is short and we are competing against technology and online entertainments.
This was a thought-provoking and well-written read that will appeal to young readers across the board. It had a really strong voice and a compelling narrative that I think would capture their attention and draw them in. It kept me engrossed and I think that it's so important that the books that we purchase for both our young people and our staff are appealing to as broad a range of readers as possible - as well as providing them with something a little 'different' that they might not have come across in school libraries before.
This was a really enjoyable read and I will definitely be purchasing a copy for school so that our young people can enjoy it for themselves. A satisfying and well-crafted read that I keep thinking about long after closing its final page - and that definitely makes it a must-buy for me!

I think it should be clearer that this book is the second in a trilogy. Having not read the first one I found there were too many characters to keep a handle on. Meeting them in the first book probably helps with this.
There were some characters and stories I really liked but others did not hold my attention. The usual Bernieres humour and charm is here in spades.
I think it would be unfair to leave this fewer stars on goodreads when I haven't read the series. Thank you for the galley.

This is a book with a complex storyline and many different characters. Upon reading it I didn't realise it's actually a sequel to another book "The Dust That Falls From Dreams". I don't feel like I missed anything by not having read the previous book, but on the other hand I did struggle at the beginning of the book to get the hang of all the characters and who they are, because there are so many.

The characters are all members of the same family, or connected to the family. The main character is Daniel, and the book follows him and his extended family through the period between the World Wars. Daniel was an flying ace in World War I, and he and his wife moved to Ceylon following the war. He is blissfully happy there but she is not, and the main story throughout the book is the decline of his marriage and how this effects his relationship with his children.

There were a lot of colourful characters in the book. My favourites were Oily Wragge the gardener, the very bohemian couple Christabel and Gaskell, and Daniel himself, although he definitely makes some questionable decisions, he also has a lot of heartache and loss to deal with in the book.

The writing is wonderfully rich and full of life. Each character is an individual, and their stories are intertwined as those of a family always are. The turmoil of the times is evident, but life must go on and there are plenty of other factors to concern people at the time, just trying to live their normal lives the best they can. That comes through in this story, which is both joyful and full of sadness. I have never read anything by de Bernieres before, but he is a very poetic and emotive writer, and I really enjoyed this book.

This maybe wasn't my favourite read of the year. I enjoyed most aspects of the story, but it was part of a series (which I wasn't aware of) which, of course, made it much harder to read than it otherwise would have been. I find Louis de Bernieres' writing incredibly hard to follow at times as well, which is more personal preference but did also detract from my overall enjoyment. The characterisation and historical description were both great, but the writing, not really my thing.

The compassionate, decent Daniel and his contemptible, God fearing wife Rose made for a compelling story and I did find myself lost in the lives of the two of them and their extensive families. However, I did get extremely confused as to who belonged to which family? Also the constant change of person and tense made for uneasy reading at times. Added to this were the various foreign phrases, which more often than not had, no explanations! Please Mr Deberniere, we are not all linguistic experts such as your Daniel! The ending was as it should be, though a little sudden. Howeverm it was a story beautifully told with pathos and humour and I refused to let any of this spoil it for me! I loved it!

It's been a long time since I'd read any Louis de Bernieres, so when I got the chance to read "So Much Life Left Over" from Netgalley, I jumped at it.

This is a beautiful, bittersweet, moving novel that follows the lives of various members of a family and their associated friends from Ceylon back to the UK with a side trip to Germany over a period spanning the early to mid twentieth century.

If you love de Bernieres' writing, you won't be disappointed by this. It's sad and you may well shed a tear or two, but the characters are so brilliantly observed, you won't mind, as you're swept along with the lives of the characters.

Thanks to Netgalley for the ARC without obligation.

I would rate this a 3. I received this book from NetGalley in exchange for an unbiased review. I did not realize this was he second book in a trilogy but the story stood on its own. It follows several characters from the end of the Great War to the early years of World War II, from the tea plantations of Ceylon to Great Britain and Germany. There were many characters, many likeable but some very unlikeable. Honestly, I had trouble finding the story line believable and realistic. It probably fit into the author’s intent for making it into a trilogy, but some of the characters were so extreme that I thought detracted from a believable plot. I would have liked to see more development in the locales, some exotic, where the story took place but instead focused more on the characters.

This is my first Louis de Bernieres book, and I'm looking forward to reading the rest of his work. His writing is so beautiful and vivid, especially the descriptions of Ceylon. The characters are wittily observed, and demonstrate the societal changes that happened after WWI well. Overall the story was quite sad, but there were so many lighthearted moments that reading it never felt depressing.

When I started reading this book I didn’t realise that it was actually a sequel to an earlier book called The Dust that Falls from Dreams. It didn’t stop me reading it as an independent entity but finding that out explained why some odd characters surfaced without much relevance to the plot.

That is pretty simple. Daniel Pitt, fresh from the First World War, tries to find things to do before the outbreak of the second. He starts off in Ceylon, in love with his wife and everything looks idyllic but then they lose a child and she’s never the same again. She’s called Rosie and she should really have married his brother Archie who nurses a lifetime passion for her but that’s another thing that goes wrong and Archie’s life is destroyed as a consequence. Meanwhile Rosie has two sisters, with whom Daniel gets involved and that story gets complicated too. Around the edges, some old ladies go mad and the working class diversion, Oily Wragge, just gets on with life.

It should be quite a miserable book since Daniel starts off with everything hunky-dory and ends up looking forward to being killed on special operations in the Second World War. Things haven’t gone that well. Actually, they have gone disastrously and, perhaps, that is the theme of the book. Things never work out as you hope and it’s mostly downhill!

Having said that, it is an entertaining read and I think that is because there’s an authenticity about this life and the way that it is described which draws you in. I don’t know if it’s intentional but Daniel is a pretty hopeless character happy to stride about waving his gun but struggling to cope with his own emotional state and needs. You feel sympathy for him. Rosie is unsympathetically drawn, plain nasty at times and overly religious. I thought this portrayal was a bit cruel and Daniel’s stiff upper lip was as big a problem in their relationship as her state of mind. It’s these uncertainties and what ifs which give a story like this its strength and Louis de Bernières can certainly tell a good one. Recommended!

I received a copy of this book from the publishers via net galley and I am incredibly grateful for that opportunity. It is unfortunate that nothing in the net galley info identifies that this is the second in a series as i would have tried to read it in order. There are facets of the narrative and characterisation that are not completely grasped at first because there is no recap from the first book.

Whilst there are facets of this book which are classic of the author there are also some very different aspects to the book. It is an incredibly easy read once you have everyone identified and there are real portraits of the hardships in Daniel's life in particular. The author really captures the emotive essence of the narrative but in some sways this is countered by the bland characterisation at times. It sometimes felt that the things which really made a character were omitted or glossed over. The author has covered a large historical era and brought it to life.

To me there are some problems I couldn't quite believe the openly gay relationship in the era being portrayed, or Daniel's agreement to their proposition. It feels like the author has popped in characters and story lines from all levels and sides of society in order to appeal to the current mores for being certain not to discriminate.

The story is set in Ceylon inbetween the two world wars.. This is the second book in the trilogy.
The main characters of this book are Rosie and Daniel; who's marriage is unfortunately in trouble.
There's a brief history of the different religions in Ceylon at the time and how people judged them.
Once the family return to England Rosie's three sisters become strong characters within the story and their quests for changes.
I struggled a bit with this book as I hadn't previously read the 1st book.

The First World War is over for what remains of ‘The Pals’ – the Pitt, Pendennis and Mc Cosh children who used to play together as youngsters. First introduced in ‘The Dust that Falls from Dreams’, Daniel is now married to Rosie and everyone is trying to cope with peacetime after not needing to question their usefulness, goals and personal choices for so long. For heroic flying aces the astonishment at surviving the war is matched only by confusion as to what to do next in life…

We follow the relationships, new starts, trials and errors of the Pals and how they start to rebuild their lives. We see how personalities have been affected by the horrors of WW1 – mental illness, bitterness and disillusionment for some and a hopeful ‘new start’ and social changes for the better, for others – of course this is all read with a growing sense of dread as we all know what is looming. We also hear others' accounts of their war experiences - Oily Wragge's recount of his time in Mesopotamia is an education in itself and the way M. de Bernieres writes in the voices of certain characters is outstanding (Samadara too).

I do have to say though – you can’t end a book like that! I had to check my Kindle wasn’t malfunctioning – there are so many unresolved issues especially concerning Daniel and his family, Archie, Samadara and Rosie’s lies (or ‘omissions’); what’s going to happen to them all throughout the Second World War…? For this reason I have deducted a star – this feels like a ‘filler’ book (which may be conscious for that between-the-wars ‘static’ period); but if I hadn’t fallen in love with some of ‘The Pals’ in the first book, I don’t know if my interest would have held through this one quite so easily. Daniel’s time in Germany felt rushed/glossed over (there was another book there!) Rosie feels ‘one dimensional’ if you only read this book – reasons for how she is (and therefore gaining some empathy on the part of the reader) surely can only be there if the first book is read?

It was thoroughly enjoyable, and I’m being nit-picky dropping a star but this is due to my annoyance at the book stopping where it did – (which does show what a damn good story it is), but not as superb as the first instalment, so you must read both! –And I need M. Dr Bernieres to get writing again because I cannot wait long for the third book – I NEED to know what happens – particularly on the Ceylon front! Hurry up…please

This is the second book in a tribology but you do not need to have read the first book "The Dust that Falls from Dreams" (although this is a good book too and definitely worth a read.) I enjoyed this book and look forward to reading the 3rd book.

This is a truly beautiful book written about humanity during a particularly trying time in human history - all of the characters are exquisitely written and defy all stereotypes and moulds.

The chapters alternate between the perspectives of Daniel and Rosie, the central couple, and those around them. This gives a larger scope of what life was like between the two wars, including some insight into British colonised India (in not too sympathetic a way, thankfully).

My favourite characters had to be Rosie's sisters - all of them were tough and very, very funny women. They face everything with great humour and energy, refusing to stay idle now they've tasted what it's like to really contribute.

Most of the characters were only just old enough to contribute to the war effort during WW1, so this book follows their adjustment to surviving the war, trying to get their lives on track and then being faced with a second world war.

This was a very moving read, the writing style fits in perfectly with the time and is a playful mixture of prudishness and candour - everybody was getting up to the same shenanigans they do today, they just came up with wonderful euphemisms for them.
The characters and their stories are very real in this book, so there's no fairy tale ending given that the book ends as WW2 begins but it's something truly beautiful.

I was attracted by the idea of following a diverse group of characters at home and abroad during the inter-war years of the 20th century, adapting to a different world, but the story’s execution left me cold. At 30% I’d had enough of its lack of subtlety, its unengaging characters and uninspiring writing. My loss, perhaps. I couldn’t recommend this unless you are already a fan of Louis de Bernieres’ work.