The Push is the story of Blythe, a woman who strives to escape from the line of mothers before her. Her mother and grandmother being women who did not want, nor manage, motherhood and the devastation they left behind which carried down to Blythe.

Blythe and Fox meet, fall in love, marry and then follows Violet, their eldest child. Blythe struggles with motherhood for years until Sam is born. There follows new struggles and devastations. Is Blythe able to move away from what seems her destiny to follow in her mother and grandmothers footsteps?

I started reading this book late on a Tuesday night and finished in 24 hours. I couldn’t put it down and read at every opportunity. It’s an honest, raw description of motherhood that moves away from the typical happy stories that we get bombarded with. Definitely worth 5 stars!

I enjoyed this . it took me awhile to be pulled in oddly maybe as read some similar novels but this stands up in its own right .
Never quite sure if the mother is suffering mental health ,Post Partum or what if her daughter really is a sociopathic personality .
I will look out for this author again and be curious as to how she progresses
I gave it four stars as felt was good enough to make me not know for sure what the real story was behind this fractious ,mutual mistrust and game playing in this strange mum and daughter relationship.
What happened first the mothers detachedness or the daughters potentially dangerous traits .
There is a sense of dread either that the daughter has been the focus of a mothers paranoia or for the mother living in anticipation of the next deed the daughter may commit and how sever this may be .
Your fear for others throughout this story is palpable
Really good read.
Have posted to good reads...link wasn’t there and ty for the advanced copy publishers and netgalley

Best book I've read in ages! I absolutely loved this, found it really difficult to put down. The writing was brilliant, it all felt incredibly real. And of course the is she/isn't she evil question kept me guessing right to the end. This author is hugely talented, definitely recommend.

How do I even start trying to talk about this book?

Ok, so, I knew it was going to be dark, uncomfortable and immersive, I’d read a fair bit of ‘wow, this book though’ reaction on social media. Little did I know just how much this story was going to get under my skin.

‘Family history, written in our genes is handed down the generations. From Mother to daughter. The good and the bad. We cannot choose what we inherit. We cannot decide what we are. Sometimes we get to be angels.
And sometimes monsters...’

I have a beautiful grown up daughter and I’ll forever be my mothers daughter even though she’s passed. The Push took me down the memory lane of my own childhood and motherhood.

Being a Mum or a Dad to a son or a daughter will magnify the intensity of Audrains story tenfold. I felt such strangeness in my stomach reading this book. I had to put it down and gather myself numerous times.

When I first finished, I was almost 100% sure I wouldn’t be able to review it. It kind of hurt. I laid in bed that night mulling over it’s content, my emotions were muddled.

Did I enjoy it? Was I prepared enough to get through it? Did it dig up some personal stuff?
Not sure. No, I don’t think I was. And categorically yes, it did.

This is a story about society’s expectations of motherhood. How a woman is supposed to have some kind of pre-installed knowledge of how to do things right. Feel things right. To naturally nurture. And perhaps use your own childhood as a template to do a great job and bring up a perfectly rounded, delightful human being.

But what if your childhood was horrific? What do you pass on then? Knowingly or unknowingly. It’s a chilling thought.

So your feelings aren’t quite right. The sleep deprivation is blamed. It’s just your hormones, it’ll pass. The adjustment period gently mentioned by those who ‘do it right’.
But what about paranoia? IS IT paranoia? Darkness. Guilt. Self-loathing. Confusion. Distrust. I could reel off a load.

Come on, be a doting Mummy, it’s such a precious gift. Love every minute of it, they grow up so quickly.

I have to keep too many secrets about Blythe and Fox. Violet and Sam. I’m not giving much away about the story itself or the three generations of women that hold this story together in the worst way possible. It would spoil it.

I am astonished by how this story made me feel. I was hooked the minute I started it. It felt so raw, so real. This may well be psychologically thrilling, but, oh the HORROR.

The Push is absorbing, I was enthralled by how Audrain intertwined the generations with each other. I struggle with multiple timelines usually but I had no difficulty here.

The characters are believable, expertly created and emotionally complex yet so easy to relate to, to have an opinion about.

It’s hard to say I enjoyed reading The Push, how can you possibly enjoy something that makes the hairs on your neck stand up when you’ve read a paragraph that forces you to put the book down.

I could of been reading a true story, and that’s what stunned me most of all.

As I come to the end of talking about one of the THE hardest books I’ve read this year, I’ll say this; that perfect family over there, you know the one, nice home, all smiley, living their idyllic life, Sunday morning football, ballet class, home baking, whatever. If you look hard enough, you might just spot a psychopath beginning to emerge.

An unforgettable five star read.

The Push by Ashley Audrain is published on 7th January 2021 by Penguin Michael Joseph

Thank you to the publisher for sending me a advance copy in exchange for an honest review.

A proper page-turner and not at all what I expected. The Push is an accomplished debut, well-written and reminiscent of We Need To Talk About Kevin. The dynamic between Blythe and Violet is electric and at points I found myself holding my breath. Some seriously heart-wrenching twists and a chilling premise, I really enjoyed this book. Huge thanks to Michael Joseph and NetGalley for the ARC!

The Push has had rather a lot of hype of Twitter and naturally it made me curious so I requested an ARC and I am SO GLAD I did. The story is mainly from Blythe's perspective, her experiences of motherhood and the unexpected challenges, stresses and in some aspects disappointments, but we also see glimpses of her mother and grandmother throughout the book. None of them have had an easy relationship with their own mothers for various reasons and this raises the question, is this something which can be overcome or is it inevitable that it will continue down future family lines.

Motherhood, what it means and the long perpetuated myth that it is what every girl wants and will ease into like a duck to water are large parts of the book but by no means the whole thing. There are plenty of other themes which make it such a compelling and gripping read. The story will potentially horrify those who live in a 'Mother Earth' style 'motherhood is the best and most rewarding thing you ever do' world with rose tinted specs on. Motherhood is hard and when you don't bond immediately, you can't sleep and your husband makes supportive noises but leaves you to flounder, it is even worse.

I stayed up well into the wee small hours so I could finish this book because putting it down seemed utterly ridiculous. I had to know what would happen next and how things would pan out. There are very definite similarities with We Need To Talk About Kevin although the story is also very different in many ways. Having questioned my own ability to mother having been bailed on by my own at an early age, this book really spoke to me. I hate when reviewers talk about 'the end' of a book so I won't say more than I was desperate for it not to finish where it did. A very well written and thought out story. It won't be for everyone but I think that it should be.

I fully agree with the tag line best debut of 2021. Easily reads like a true story, really realistic and I’m still thinking about the book days later..
High praise indeed.

2-2.5 stars

This was one of the most unsatisfying books I’ve ever read and it presented a completely messed up family, situation and bunch of relationships. There was little hope in this story and lots of dread. That title was innocuous at first but it quickly conjured foreshadowing and actually, I found a fair bit of the story predictable.

If I listed all the trigger warnings, it’d be an essay but what I struggled with most was reading about neglect. There’s something about that form of abuse that cuts me deep. This story was about legacy, three mothers but mostly Blythe, all products of their nature/nurture and how that played out with the fourth generation…Violet. It felt like a horror movie at times.

There was a whole lot of mental illness, especially in the previous generations and dare I say, psychopathy and sociopathy. It made for discomforting reading for sure. With Blythe however, things seemed somewhat diluted in terms of her own health but that legacy was strong.

The narrative style was odd. The story was written like a letter to a significant character in the book using both first and third person. Short, abrupt sentences were often the order of the day. However, there was a compelling element to this story that kept me reading, even when I disliked the subject matter rather intensely. The ending was exasperating though.

I think people will either love or hate this book. I expect it to be polarising and you can see which pole I neared. I do like thrillers but I am choosy with the context matter, this wasn’t my cup of tea with the abuse focus. However, those able to read about these subjects more easily may find The Push to be more up their street.

Thank you to Michael Joseph for the early review copy.

To be honest it took me a few chapters to get into “The Push” by Ashley Audrain but once I did I really enjoyed it. Nice snappy short chapters. Good character definition. But the ending was so abrupt and questions left unanswered.....

Blythe has had a hard childhood, her mum left when she was ten and her dad tried his best to bring her up but she missed her mother. Now grown and pregnant with her first child Blythe is worried she will not be a good mother, Blythe struggles to bond with Violet finding her a cold calculating child, when she falls pregnant again her bond with Sam is instant but when tagsgedy happens Blythe questions if Violet really did the unthinkable.

A sad story but kept me gripped.

The Push is a thriller with the complexities and difficulties of motherhood at its heart.

Blythe is writing to her ex-husband, Fox, explaining their lives together and since exploring, in particular, her role as a mother to their children Violet and Sam. Blythe’s history as a daughter haunts her mothering and confuses Fox whose family has always been tight-knit, his relationship with his mother a loving and positive one.
The focus of Blythe’s narrative is her daughter, Violet. Given her own difficult history with her mother, and in turn her mother’s relationship with her own mother who committed suicide, the story allows rooms for us to question natural mothering instincts and to ask whether Blythe might have been predisposed through nature or nurture, to struggle with the demands of motherhood. And the book is full of these difficult questions about how society views motherhood and how those ideals then torture the lives of individual mothers attempting to embrace them.

These questions that Blythe ask herself over and again, are compelling enough, but when Violet’s subtly unusual behaviour is added to the mix, the compulsion to find out whether Blythe’s suspicions are true makes it hard not to read the novel in one long sitting.

I can’t discuss the book too much more without spoiling the plot, but it’s safe to say that it explores similar territory to We Need to Talk About Kevin by Lionel Shriver. Interesting that Shriver’s novel too has letters between the parents in it, as if exploring parenthood and its pressures, especially when things go wrong, requires distanced, considered words to the other partner in the parenting family, as if guilt, as well as love, responsibility and care, has to be apportioned and negotiated and unfairly that guilt is often handed in full to the mother. In this novel, that guilt is given over to a chain of mothers and though the book is fast-paced and thrilling, underneath the drive of the plot are very serious questions about why society still blames mothers for their children’s mistakes and how the human character is truly formed.

I wouldn’t say I enjoyed reading The Push - it was too discomforting to feel pleasurable - but there is no denying the power of this exploration of love, motherhood and the development of character. Out in January 2021, preorder it now for some scary new year reading.

Wow! This novel about motherhood is phenomenally good in that it captures so well what it is to be human. The writing has a poetic and visceral quality which quickly draws you in and there's also an honesty that you rarely see. The characters are complex and convincing and the plot compelling. A startling portrayal of the poison that can run through families, but also an intense and gripping psychological thriller.

Ashley Audrain is definitely going to be a very successful writer if her debut novel, The Push, is anything to go by. The film rights have been snapped up even before the novel's release. Not many authors get that confirmation of their ability so early in their career.

The Push is a tight, doom-laden telling of any parent's worse nightmare, the death of a child - particularly when that death may have been caused by a psychotic sibling. Was the sibling involved? Or was it just a freak accident as everyone else claims? And was nurture fine and nature to blame, given the matriarchal history?

Excellent, believable characters, and superb writing should make this a solid 5-star review, but I found it slightly frustrating in places, so dipping to a 4.

Chapters were short (there were 85 in total) in the James Patterson style - punchy, in media res, all ending on a hanging or a revelation. This is fine, as is the taught writing, but it was unrelenting. Yep, it created the atmosphere, but even the flashbacks to happier times had the same claustrophobia - it needed an occasional change of gear to create that contrast with the fear and dread. One final thought was that while the story was very good, it was also very thin. It could've done with a few more twisty turns to keep the reader on their toes.

This was such a beautifully written book about motherhood & the expectations on mothers to have unconditional love for their children. It explores the relationships between mothers and daughters and spans 4 generations jumping between present day and 2 other timelines.
The main character Blythe didn't have a good relationship with her mother and is looking forward to being a mother herself however when her daughter is born she doesn't feel the connection she is expecting and becomes paranoid about her daughters behaviour. Is she paranoid though?
A gripping read that is both dark & twisty.

This is a beautifully written, heartbreaking book about mothers and children and relationships.

Blythe is keen to break the cycle within her family. However, when her daughter, Violet is born, she senses something wrong.

What follows is a tense story of motherhood and family that maintains suspense throughout.

A solid 3* Good Read.

This is an incredibly intense novel, you might well want a light filler book before your next!

Blyth’s husband really wants a family but Blythe is plagued by concerns she is not maternal given her family history, as the novel progresses you can see quite clearly why she was concerned.

This is an extraordinary novel that is so well written you cannot put it down but you also will feel disturbed!

Quite a disturbing story - and a little hard to follow at times. Flicking from one era to another got a little confusing. But an interesting story and kept me interested to the end.

The Push by Audrey Audrain
This is a tense psychological drama about mothers and their relationship with their daughters. Blythe had appeared to have an almost non-existent relationship with her mother, Cecelia. Cecelia in turn had a troubled relationship with her mother, Etta. Blythe heads off to college, turning her back on her life before and falls headlong into a relationship with Fox. He is the product of a warm family background and has a good relationship with is parents.
As Blythe begins her relationship with Fox she believes they too can create a happy family together. Returning home from a difficult birth Blythe finds it hard to bond with her baby and finds her daughter’s behaviour increasingly troubling. Violet however only has eyes for her father, manipulating him and driving a wedge between him and Blythe.
It is when Blythe and Fox decide to have another children that the situation become increasingly difficult.
The characters are well drawn and the author draws you into this difficult and unsettling situation. The only character I felt was not developed fully enough was Fox. We knew very little about how he was feeling during everything which took place. From the opening of the novel we picture many different endings but it is still a surprise when the book finishes as it does.
I found the story involving and felt compassion for all of the characters with the exception of Fox as I did not feel I knew him enough to become emotionally involved with him. It is definitely a book which I will recommend to others and I am sure will stimulate a great deal of discussion about mothers and the ability to bond.
I would like to say many thanks to the author, the publishers and Net Galley for the opportunity to read this book in return for an honest review.

Wow this was an excellent psychological thriller! Such atmospheric writing and creepy as hell. I loved the way the story played out over 3 timelines and how the author plays with our minds and leaves us wondering who's side we are on! Fantastic read.

This book was so chilling- in so many ways I could relate as a mother, but in others I couldn’t imagine what she was going through. This book brings the emotional issues of being a mother to the masses. Extremes are hard to read about, but this was done so well. A gripping read for anyone, especially those who have children of their own and those who have experienced unconditional love.