I loved this book. So refreshing to see a woman in her late fifties at the height of her powers and not wholly defined by her relationships with others: mother, wife. Fiona Maye is a judge in the Family Court. She is thoughtful, humane and compassionate in the way we want all our judges to be. Her husband of thirty years suddenly drops a bombshell- he asks her permission to sleep with a younger woman. She refuses, horrified, but soldiers on with her professional life while her marriage hangs in the balance, unresolved. The matters that come before her -including an underage Jehovah’s Witness with leukaemia who refuses a blood transfusion- engage and change her.
Fiona Maye is a hero for the modern day: intuitive, connected, intelligent and kind. While I enjoyed McEwan’s other big books –On Chesil Beach, Atonement and Saturday- his writing has never been finer than it is here.
