A review by 85tarheel
When Will There Be Good News? by Kate Atkinson

5.0

Kate Atkinson writes books the absolutely defy classification. In my mind she is the immediate precursor to the incredibly rich mystery/thrillers that Tana French writes. Her language is beautiful, her characters complex (to the point of exasperation and causing me to yell at the book...not effective btw), and her stories touching in a real way that is as far from cloying as is possible. I think we all have a need to put things into boxes, to essentially make the world binary and definite, and this is just not how life is. These books reflect that basic truth. They are also classified as "Jackson Brodie books" and while that is definitely true, he is in all of them and plays an important role, he is really no more than 33% of this book as Ms. Atkinson creates other wonderful people to get to know. Family is central to this book and each of the characters has to deal with the messy realities of their own family, to often hilarious and dangerous results. She has a way of describing people that sticks with you, for instance "she drove in the way that an excitable and nearsighted chimpanzee might have done" and "a hippie-ish, well-intentioned woman called Jenny who looked as if she’d knitted herself". I love how she can capture the essential personality of Scottish folk with "'Fine,' she said, using the universal Scottish word for every state of being from 'I’m dying in anguish' to 'I’m experiencing euphoric joy.'” I think she is moving up on my list of active writers with each book I read. I started with her "literature" books and then read one of the newer Jackson Brodie books before I started going back to fill in on the series from the start. I have paced myself so that I have always has a new one to read in my future, but now I have just one more to read before I'm caught up. I'll save it for a time when I want a book that satisfies so many of my reading needs.