Rachel's Holiday: A Hay Festival and The Poole VOTE 100 BOOKS for Women Selection

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Everything was fine at work until you rang them,’ I lied frantically. ‘You’ve caused nothing but trouble. I’m going to ring Eric and tell him that you’re a lunatic, that you escaped from a bin and not to believe a word you said.’ In some ways, this book is, of course, similar to The Mystery of Mercy Close where Rachel's sister Helen spends a little time (some years after this book is set) in a psychiatric unit, but in other ways, it is almost like the tale of bereavement in .......... No, I can't say, because it would spoil it if you haven't already read it!

To celebrate the 25th birthday today of Marian Keyes’s now classic novel Rachel’s Holiday, we asked fellow writers to explain what Rachel and Marian mean to them Margaret,’ I said briskly, ‘there’s nothing wrong with me. I’m sorry you’ve had a wasted journey, but please go away and take your husband with you. This is all a big, huge, terrible mistake.’ Rachel, from what I can gather I think they were just about to anyway,’ said Dad’s voice from across the Atlantic. What's interesting is that this writer didn't make the process light and fluffy. Rachel had a painful and slow road to recovery. Her process of denial was EXCRUCIATING for me, but I came to understand her. I came to see why she had been such an idiotic idiot head!

I cried. In fact, it was more like weeping. I actually considered rating this 3 stars, because what I wanted was to read a book that would make me laugh, but what happened was the entire time I was reading, the tears just wouldn't stop. Until it was about finished. I mean, why would I rate a book that made me cry to much so high? Was I nuts??

Make them practise yelling, ‘SURPRISE!’… My sisters, but especially Imelda and Philomena, won’t want to, and some of the cousins are right bitches too, but tell them there’ll be no goody bag for them if they don’t.”

At the start of the book, we are in denial as to the extent of her drug addiction problems and just think her family are being ott. Then gradually as it dawns on Rachel just how far she has fallen, our eyes are opened too and her addiction is exposed in all its ugliness. Marian Keyes has described her own battle with alcoholism and you just know she is drawing on her own experiences here. The clinic and group therapy classes have a ring of truth about them and for all the hilarity there are lines that dart straight to your heart and make you think about your own addictions. Rachel’s Holiday is a classic example. It’s not about Rachel going on a holiday! It’s about Rachel spending a little time in an Irish drying-out clinic at the insistence of her parents. Rachel doesn’t mind too much, she thinks it will be like a little spa holiday and she might even drop a few pounds too but she wasn’t bargaining for the harsh realities ahead of her.

Marian is one of the true greats. Her wit, warmth, openness and vulnerability make you feel like you're in the company of an old friend. The ease with which she moves sometimes makes you underestimate her genius, which I think probably suits her just fine. Rachel.’ Dad sighed heavily. ‘I barely said a thing to this Eric chap, he did all the talking and he seemed delighted to let you go.’ Keyes became known for her novels Watermelon, Lucy Sullivan Is Getting Married, Rachel's Holiday, Last Chance Saloon, Anybody Out There, and This Charming Man, which, although written in a light and humorous style, cover themes including alcoholism, depression, addiction, cancer, bereavement, and domestic violence. [1] More than 35 million copies of her novels have been sold, and her works have been translated into 33 languages. [2] Her writing has won both the Irish Popular Fiction Book and the Popular Non-Fiction Book of the Year, each on one occasion, at the Irish Book Awards. But I found myself inexorably drawn into her story. I couldn't put the book down. I was seriously absorbed. I HAD to find out how she was going to resolve her life. I HAD to know if she was going to come out of denial, if she was going to realize what a stupid beeyatch she was....I really needed there to be resolution for this story.The life she has left, the family home where she felt suffocated by the wants and needs of those around her is the place she needs to return to to find herself. Rachel’s ageing mum – a highlight in a novel replete with beautifully well-rounded secondary characters – issues strict instructions: