"Leaving the world" by Douglas Kennedy

An audio book.

At 13, in New York, 1987, the narrator Jane tells her bickering parents that she's not going to get married or have children. Next day, her father leaves, never to return. Her mother blames her until the end, dying in her early sixties.

Jane does well at school and university. When she gets a place at Harvard with a supervisor she admires, David, her boyfriend goes to Ireland and never returns.

David's married to Polly, who used to be a promising writer and model (in Vogue) but has recently tried suicide. David started brilliantly both in fiction and non-fiction. She sleeps with him for 4 years. They have many serious discussions. He writes a novel in a modernist style as Polly suggested. It's a flop. Maybe that's what Polly intended. David dies in a traffic accident that may well have been suicide.

She turns down a lectureship, works in finance, gives $10k to her father but it's a scam. The section where the FBI explain to her her father's crimes is too long. She gets £300k severance pay because the company want to keep her quiet. She lectures, becomes unpopular for sticking to her principles. She meets Theo, a film buff, and gets pregnant by mistake, gives birth to Emily. Theo soon loses interest in fatherhood - he has a book to write. He goes into business with a woman, film marketing. He asks (and gets) $50k from Jane. It fails because of the woman's incompetence. The sections where the lawyer explains problems and solutions are far too long.

Emily dies in an accident. Jane botches a suicide, starts again in Canada as a librarian - she has to provide refs so she can't hide her past. She gains money for the library by book-dealing. Again there's a long monologue - Vern, a colleague, tells her about his mental problems after being a star piano student. Then in an uninterrupted monologue she tells Vern the details of what we already know in outline - the accident that Emily died in (her fault a little) and her assault on Theo's lover.

In what almost seems like a separate story she becomes interested in a case where a father's suspected of killing his daughter. She starts investigating, and realises there's more to the local evangelist than it seems. The suspect kills himself. She finds out where the evangelist is keeping the girl, releases her and chains the man up. The man later kills himself. She wants her name left out of the reports. She goes to Berlin, studies holocaust grief, has a brief affair and returns to see Vern.

Other reviews

• the bookbag (The character of Jane is flawed in ways that most women will understand. She has 'issues', as we all do, though she is bright, articulate and sharp; yet she demonstrates a gentleness and fragility that is beautiful and moving and makes you want to hug her. It is this likeability that makes her the key to the unputdownable nature of this book.)