A family torn apart by their father’s infidelity are forced to confront the past thirty years later. As Natalie’s younger sister, Amanda, prepares for marriage and impending motherhood, her plea for the family to reunite uncovers pent-up tension and animosity. Can they forget the past and become a family again?

Natalie’s life begins to unravel as their father starts to creep back into their lives and family tensions resurface, affecting her relationship with her boyfriend, Rob. Will the couple find their way back to each other, and can a family that has been torn apart ever heal their wounds?

Can you ever walk away from someone you love, or do some fires never die out?

This is a painstaking, fascinating page turner of a novel, and the Frost Magazine  review team isn’t surprised to learn that debut author, Catherine Yardly originally wrote Ember as a film script, because it LIVES. Hardly surprising when one realises that before becoming a writer, Yardley spent some years as a  successful actor, who  knows all about making characters live.

So how did the script become Ember, the novel? As happens to so many early endeavours the script  was put aside when another idea  intruded – this time for a novel, set in the acting world. In the dormant time between drafts Yardley came across the script once more, and realised …  it should have been a novel. Ember was reborn, which meant changes, research, and a great deal of thought about the dynamics of familial relationships, the acceptance of past, perhaps present failings, or  does one chose unacceptance.

In Ember Yardley explores the divisions that ensue when siblings take opposing points of view regarding a father’s  historical unfaithfulness, a division heightened by  the pain of infertility raising its head.

Will the wedding be the start of a glimmer of reconciliation, of understanding, of healing and forgiveness? Or will it cause more fragmentation as memories become ever more vivid and outrage is stoked.  And just how did Yardley  bring such empathy and understanding to a family under such strain, and to the pain of infertility?

Yardley says: ‘I feel like some people don’t realise how much research goes into a work of fiction. I had to research fertility treatment as I am lucky enough to never have needed any. I also had to research little things about driving from one place to another. I had a lovely doctor friend who writers for Frost Magazine called Dr Kathleen Thompson who answered a lot of questions and helped me create an accurate portrayal of an obstetrician’s work life.’

Yes, indeed, research is crucial, so too observation, reflection, empathy and an actor’s ability to BE a character and make it tick. So, here we have it, Ember, a forensic examination of the dynamics of a family’s life. The pain, the hope, the darkness that needs to see the light of day, be aired, and blown away if possible, if not, somehow accepted, But can it be?

It takes an author of rare wisdom and skill to create a novel which unwinds past strands and empathises sufficiently to see the different perspectives at work, and somehow bring the whole caboosh to a credible resolution. The author weaved her magic and breaks the reader’s  heart but also warms  it. She reminds us that hope can take over from trauma, division and … well, just family discord dug deep.

She reminds us that quite frankly, no-one is perfect, some less so than others. But begs the question: how long should we  go on harbouring resentment? I suspect it is something most of us have had to work out for ourselves,

Does this make it sound too heavy? Ember isn’t, It’s compelling, absorbing, and one can’t help referring back to one’s own experiences as gradually we learned to let go of fear, not to mention  animosity., or at least put it aside for the sake of the family.

I found myself asking with regard to my own life ”Did I even try to understand? Did I really want to know? Is it time to put it away now, or just walk away?

Ember is evocative, wise,  discerning, and page turning. We close the book,   the character strands unwound, a  resolution but it’s up to you to read it and discover what resolution. But more, we put it on the bookshelf aware that we have more understanding of others,  and ourselves. What more can you ask of a novel.

In a word, Ember by  Catherine Yardley, is beautifully written,  and resonates. Bravo.

Ember by Catherine Yardley. in pb and e-book. Available here