#BlogTour-‘Something To Live For’ by Richard Roper

Many thanks to Tracy Fenton of Complusive Readers and Orion for my my gifted ebook copy of ‘Something To Live For’ by Richard Roper and the blogtour invite!

About the book…

Sometimes you have to risk everything to find your something…

All Andrew wants is to be normal. He has the perfect wife and 2.4 children waiting at home for him after a long day. At least, that’s what he’s told people.

The truth is, his life isn’t exactly as people think and his little white lie is about to catch up with him.

Because in all Andrew’s efforts to fit in, he’s forgotten one important thing: how to really live. And maybe, it’s about time for him to start.

If I was to say to you, ‘Listen you REALLY must read this book-it’s about a man who works for the council, checking the houses of dead people for funds to pay for their state funerals and it’s SO GOOD,’ you would think I have lost my bookblogger mind.

The term ‘life-affirming’ is bandied about willy-nilly but this is exactly what ‘Something To Live For’ is. Andrew, the protagonist, lives in a narrative of his own making, keeping work and home firmly apart. For someone so invested in death he has one hell of a time living.

He makes model railways, keeps real life at arms length by interacting with fellow enthusiasts online, has an invented life which he talks about at work to keep his colleagues at bay.

But life will force him to engage with it whether he likes it or not-his boss suddenly decides that a ‘Come Dine With Me’ style bonding experience will be exactly what their office needs. So how is Andrew going to stop his real and make believe lives intersecting when everything is now at stake? And that is without his new co-worker Peggy who, against his better judgement, gets under his skin…

There is just so much depth to this novel that I resolutely refuse to believe it is a debut.

It’s darkly funny yet so, so moving that you cannot help but be swept up in the rationale behind Andrew’s lies and how he becomes trapped in them. There is a sweet and quiet dignity to the funerals he attends to make sure he at least sees off the people who are dying of loneliness. The stories of his clients are unbearably moving-sometimes not found for days, in one case, months, and the very notion that a person could have made such an insignificant impact on the world and its history is intolerably cruel.

In death Andrew and Peggy find the meaning of life and step by step Andrew finds his place in the world, and in doing, returns this to the dead. It’s a beautiful meditation on social isolation, courage and grief, absolutely 100% recommended and with such a lovely finale that your breath catches in your chest.

And if someone could please stop cutting onions as I cannot see the keyboard clearly…

*recommended to read with copious amounts of biscuits, tea and tissues followed by checking in on friends and family that maybe you meant to ring but never had the time-make the time you don’t know how long any of us have*

About the author…

Richard Roper is a non-fiction editor at Headline, an imprint of Hachette UK.

He lives in London.

His debut novel,’ Something To Live For’, a darkly funny and uplifting story, was pre-empted in major deals by Orion in the UK and Putnam in the US, as well as over a dozen international territories, for publication in Summer 2019.

Links-https://www.compulsivereaders.com/

Twitter @richardroper

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