I adore Cecilia Aherns books I really, really do. Some of them have a really special place in my heart and are amount my favourite books I have ever and will ever read. I devour them all hungrily and greedily like gulping down water after waking up in the morning after eating a Chinese. I have had this book on my to read list since way before Christmas time when I first discovered that it was coming out.

We first meet Alice when she is a child she is living in a toxic household, with a mother who doesn't really care about her and wishes she wasn't around. The mother is suffering from terrible depression or so we think at first. Alice one days comes home from school and finds her mother asleep however there is a blue hue surrounding her and all over the room, it is seeping through Alice's sink. Alice thinks something terrible has happened to her mother and so she calls an ambulance. However her mother is fine and it is here that we discover that Alice has a very rare condition where she can see the colours of people. She can tell what they are thinking, how they are feeling just by looking at the colours they are omitting.

We see Alice struggling to come to terms and trying to understand something so monumental .mostly on her own, trying to work through life, family life ect which is really hard and scary for her.

We see her through her schooling life, her teenage years, her adultlesence, her adulthood, motherhood, married life and old age. We see her family evolve and change and all the struggles and turmoils that brings. We see her ups and downs and everything in-between. We discover how glorious and how frightening this ability is and how she must navigate the world.

People think that this ability would be great. But I'm not so sure. I'm not sure because think about how hard it is to have to explain things to people for them to not understand you and to never feel like you fit in, anywhere. Never having anyone really truly understand and get you. Having noone to be able to relate to you and to have noone be able to talk to you about things and discuss things with you and to help you make sense and understand what you go through every single minute if every single day of your life.

It is a book that talks to us about the importance of kindness, the importance of never judging someone by their actions, or words alone, but to try and get to know the real person because you never know what internal struggles someone is secretly dealing with. It is a book that begs the read to show compassion and understanding to everyone they meet, especially to people who are different to them and whose lives are different to our own.

Everyone has their own struggles in life, everyone has things that they have to try to understand and work through, everyone has things that are hard and difficult. But I can say that having a few things that rarely most people have is difficult, it's difficult to find people to believe you and to understand you and to appreciate and get you for who you are. It's hard to live in a world where most people do not have pain in their every waking moment and to not fit in with the norms of sociatal expectations. But to look to the outside world like you should and to look like you have everything together all the time. This book shines a light on people who are like this and how completely draining and hard life can feel and be. Thank you for writing this book Cecelia. It was written with such poise, such care, such understand and much love. I applaude you and thank you for the hard work and effort it must have taken to write this book. It means alot.

I loved this book. I was hooked straight away and didn't want it to end. It is the story of Alice who can see people like others can't and how she navigates through her day to day life.

Firstly I must say how much I admired the cover shown on the site, beautiful and so evocative of what was to come. An amazing story of what could be seen as a disability, but had so many more layers. Thank you for a chance to review this book, it was extremely readable.

I enjoyed the way in which the main character, Alice, develops and learns to overcome the problems created by her chaotic childhood.

For me the references to synaesthesia were overdone. These sort of issues have been dealt with more sensitively in other books such as Once there were Wolves. However colour synaesthesia does provide a useful tool for investigating strong emotions in relationships. The story illustrated feelings that exist in all of us, and in extreme forms when we are under stress, but are difficult to acknowledge and deal with.

I found Hugh a bit too good to be true, whereas the younger brother, Ollie, was tragic but recognisable.

The writing is clear and economical, covering a lifetime of experience and character growth effectively. Different environments are created and help to illustrate how Alice finds an expansive and fulfilling life from a challenging start.

A sad story, but an enjoyable and, ultimately, encouraging read.

A hard read. I did not liked at all all the back and forward from Alices life. It was hard to realize when I was reading from the past or her present life. And the last part was on full speed. The jumping from one age to another without a “heads up” notice made the reading even harder.
I loved the main Idea with the colors and the way she grow with this experience, how it shaped her, but that is one of very few things I like. I have read all oF Cecelia Aherns novels, only ROAR was worst than this one

Cecelia is one of my favourite authors. In fact her book The Gift is one of my all time favourite books. I really enjoyed this book too & will recommend it to others.

What a beautiful book this is! It’s full of heart, wisdom, emotion and love. I found it a little difficult to sink into at first, but then was drawn into the story and am so glad that I was! It’s powerful, and resonated with me in a way that I wasn’t expecting. The characters are beautifully depicted, flawed, imperfect and damaged, which I really liked. The story itself is very intriguing and compelling, and is wonderfully written. I loved the colours in this book, and how they are portrayed. The ending is perfectly written, and left me in tears. A lovely book that left me wanting more. Very highly recommended.

This was such a gem of a read and came at just the right time. I was starting to get in a bit of a slump so flicked through the first few pages of several books and as soon as I began this one I just felt myself get swept away by it.

I don’t want to say anything more than the blurb says regarding the plot, and the beauty of this book is letting it all unfold. It left me feeling such a mix of emotions and I found it to be very thought- provoking whilst also incredibly readable. I will say I preferred the first half of the book, only because the pacing is very different in the latter half, but I do understand why it was written that way.

This just felt like true storytelling; the writing and the characters coming together was magic. I loved following Alice through her life, watching her grow and adapt, nurturing the love in her life and learning to let go. Highly recommend this one.

This was the second book I had picked up within a week which had synesthesia as part of the premis for the story , this is the ability of the lead character in the novel to see the emotions of others as colours surrounding people . This is an actual neurological process which occurs naturally in some people , the author of the novel however takes it rather further than the naturally occurring process and the ability of her lead character has a more supernatural quality almost a super power
I enjoyed discovering how the colours lead to some of her strengths but also how seeing them was often very distracting and caused significant disability , she had to wear sunglasses for example to avoid seeing the. colours all the time and this ended up making her a victim for bullies
The book is easy to read I found it was probably best placed in the women's fiction category
The characters themselves are well defined and developed in a naturalistic way , I personally found that because her synesthesia was so pronounced that I found it rather unbelievable and lost some of my enjoyment of the book because of this .

I read an early copy of this novel on NeTGalley Uk the book is published in the uk on 13th. April Uk by harper collins Uk

Alice sees the best and worst in people.
She sees peoples energy auras every day for everyone...............until one day there's a man with no aura.

This is a story of a woman finding herself and how to deal with other people's anger, darkness. A disabled mother, a brother recently out of jail and her brother and family living in Doha.
How will she cope and manage as her life develops?

I loved this book.

The main character in this unique story is Alice Kelly and what a person she is! Alice lives in Ireland with her unpredictable mother, who suffers from mental health issues and her two brothers whose personalities are like chalk and cheese.
Alice sees people’s moods and emotions through colours that can be classed as a gift but more often than not it is a curse that she has had to live with as they give her migraines and concerns that are beyond imagination. The auras she sees often seep into other people so Alice is constantly on her guard. Looking through Alice’s eyes is often exhausting but as she ages, her life is certainly an interesting read.
My thanks to Net Galley and Harper Collins for the ARC of this quirky tale.

Thanks Netgalley and the Publisher. Another great read from this fabulous author. Great characters, great storyline and wonderful read.

A good read.This was a very well written and unusual story but it was interesting seeing everything through Alice's eyes as we follow her story coming from a difficult childhood to her beautiful end where she sees different auras and colours that impacts her life.Found the chapters too long for me but I'm sure Cecelia Ahern fans will love it

What an absolutely beautiful book! Ahern weaves stories so skilfully you’re drawn in from the very start and hooked until the end. Alice and her synesthesia make this such an interesting read, and as we follow her and see the impact this has on her life you can’t help but love her.
A definite must read.

Cecelia is a magical writer, she draws you so into her characters world's you feel like you are a part of the story. This book is about a girl who has synesthesia (she sees emotions in colours) and it really made me really connect with the confusion and sense of overwhelm she would feel. It's quite a sad tale, but enthralling at the same time.

I enjoyed the story, however the one thing that stops it being 5 star is the flashbacks to the past were really confusing. One minute she was writing about the present, the next the past with no clear delineation between the 2. I don't know if that's because I was reading it on the Kindle, perhaps it's more obvious in the print book. But I struggled to keep up with the hopping between past and present

Thank you Net Gallery for the advance copy.

As a big Cecelia Ahern fan I can categorically say if this was my first book of hers it would be the last. First the book was very jumpy with no notice one minute it’s the present time, then we jump back in time for a little bit of a random story. As it’s being reviewed it didn,t have any chapters in so made it a bit worst. The story it’s self was nice I suppose but again very jumpy, one minute she was at her brothers the next she was in a pub meeting her Dad. Like I said I am a fan of Cecelia,s other work and me and my sister love telling each other when she has a new book out, unfortunately I will not be singing the praises of this book. The story of Alice and her being able to read people by there auras is interesting and I suppose everyone would like to be able to do that, I certainly would as a migraine sufferer I wouldn’t like the migraine that goes with it though. I feel like the story is not up to my expectations. Also as someone who live in Swindon I would like to point out that it’s called the Wyvern Theatre not Swindon Theatre. This really annoyed me as it proves there was not much research gone in to this book at all. Very disappointed all round

Wonderful, wonderful, wonderful. Completely captivating and a beautifully crafted rollercoaster of emotions. I absolutely loved it.

Another classic from Cecilia Aherne. I thoroughly enjoyed this, her latest, novel and would heartily recommend it.

Firstly I am grateful to NetGalley and the publishers for an ARC of this book and am leaving my honest review voluntarily.
This is a very thought-provoking book about Alice, a person with synesthesia. Each person Alice meets has their own colours enabling Alice to see who they truly are and what they are feeling on the inside despite what they might show on the outside. Whilst this may be seen as a gift Alice experiences huge difficulties managing the overwhelming emotions it creates in her.
The book allows us to travel with Alice, through her extremely difficult childhood and into adult life as she tries to make sense of her super powers, using them for the good of others whilst trying to protect herself and live a satisfying family life herself.
Whilst the book is fictional the concepts in it made me think about the power of others emotions on people in real life i.e. those in the helping professions and how we need to take care of ourselves before we can really look after others.
A very different and enjoyable read.

This is a story a traumatic childhood experiences and trauma bonding, written through the lens of synesthesia that the main character and first-person narrator is exhibiting. The idea for the plot was great, its execution - not so much, in my opinion.

Cecelia Ahern dedicates so much time and space to the protagonist's early childhood experiences, that the rest of the story (and reader follows Alice until her very last day) seems too rushed.

What I found interesting, was an attempt to adapt the first-person narration to Alice's age. In first chapters, she sounds very child-like, uses simple words and associations. Then her language matures.

What I found annoying, was the focus on the synesthetic experiences of Alice that got truly boring after a while - the protagonist focuses on colours of people's auras but there's very little explanation on how she learned to interpret them.