Ask Again, Yes – Mary Beth Keane

★ ★ ★ ★ ★

‣ sort of a bildungsroman

‣ nyc

‣ mental health, family stuff, a lil heavy ngl

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"The thing is, Peter, grown-ups don't know what they're doing any better than kids do. That's the truth."

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Ask Again, Yes is easily one of my favorite books of the year. Mary Beth Keane is a great writer. Her characters are real, they're human. By the end of the novel I felt I knew each person intimately. Their flaws are not just included to make them more relatable; they have origins that are tangible to the reader. 

Mary Beth's characters are the best kind of people. They're smart and kind. They have big hearts and open arms for the people around them. That doesn't make this a happy fairy tale—it just makes the reader root for them all. 

There are many elements of this book that appeal to me personally and likely contribute to why I enjoyed it so much. Ask Again, Yes has straight-forward, honest, and reliable narration; it spans multiple generations, and it's focused in the New York City area (is it obvious I love my hometown?). Though the plots are very different, I found myself loving this story similarly to how I love The Heart's Invisible Furies.

The problems the characters face are not far fetched, in fact, I can imagine that for many readers they'll hit close to home. In the most gentle and powerful ways, Mary Beth's characters, and in turn her readers, face trauma head on. They have the reactions we all do in its midst—they reject it, ignore it, deny it. But in the end, they face it, whatever their trauma looks like, however many faces it has. 

I am always super grateful for writers who include the truth that is uncomfortable to sit in. Truth that is from the hurt. When characters' lives aren't over embellished or over complicated they are so reflective of the struggles that make us human. Mary Beth hits the nail on the head with this novel; she's received a lot of praise for it and I am glad to contribute.

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