

Deborah Moggach, one of the keenest observers of human nature in contemporary fiction, returns with a heart-warming, poignant and wickedly funny novel about the overwhelming onrush of old age. With a light touch and wry humour, The Carer is about family, frailty and how the people we think we know the best can still always surprise us.
James is getting on a bit and needs full-time help. So Phoebe and Robert, his middle-aged offspring, employ Mandy, who seems willing to take him off their hands. But as James regales his family with tales of Mandy's virtues, their shopping trips, and the shared pleasure of their journeys to garden centres, Phoebe and Robert sense something is amiss.
Is this really their father, the distant figure who never once turned up for a sports day, now happily chortling over cuckoo clocks and television soaps?
Then something happens that throws everything into new relief, and Phoebe and Robert discover that life most definitely does not stop for the elderly. It just moves onto a very different plane - changing all the stories they thought they knew so well.
Publisher: Headline Publishing Group
ISBN: 9781472260482
Number of pages: 272
Weight: 475 g
Dimensions: 238 x 158 x 30 mm
MEDIA REVIEWS
'She infuses her subject with her trademark humour and pathos, reshaping a societal dilemma into a family drama, by turns compelling and surprising.' - The Observer
'Unputdownable, fun and tender with characters that jump off the page. Perfection' - Marian Keyes
'A heartwarming triumph' - Woman & Home
'I just loved it - so touching and wise and funny, full of all the lovely touches that Debby is so good at. She draws characters so deftly; you begin to think you know them from the smallest of observations. They're all so human!' - Sabine Durrant
'The Carer will ring bells for any reader with parents reaching the grab-rail stage of life but proves as touching as it's funny. Moggach writes in the best funny-ouch tradition, her humour always rooted in acute observation of our frailties and appetites' - Patrick Gale
'Deborah Moggach's warm heart and cool eye for hilarious British idiosyncrasies are both on top form here - I laughed like a drain. Specially at the hippy Lothario in the wet Welsh woods' - Louisa Young
'Beautifully written, oozing interesting characters that you genuinely care about' - Adele Parks
'Lit up a dull day with its warmth and wit' - Tessa Hadley
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“A great quick read about family, secrets, and betrayal.”
Phoebe and Robert are worried about their father – James is now elderly, and recently a new carer has moved in to look after him. Although James seems to be enjoying a whole new lease of life, his children become more... More
“Outstanding!”
I have long been a fan of Deborah Moggach and I grabbed the chance to read her latest novel with great enthusiasm and eagerness. I hungrily devoured all that she wrote except, for some weird reason, her mega... More
“Deborah Moggach delivers yet again”
Just loved it ! Mandy was a most wonderful character. It was full of insight, and acute observations about living with an ageing parent, and sibling dynamics!
Secrets, laughs and and thoroughly entertainment.
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