What Does it Feel Like? – Kinsella Sophie (2024)

From Sophie Kinsella comes an unforgettable, heartbreaking yet life-affirming story about a successful novelist facing a devastating diagnosis and learning to live and love anew. Eve wakes up in a hospital bed with no memory of how she got there. Her husband explains that she has undergone surgery to remove a large malignant brain tumour. As Eve learns to walk, talk and write again, she wrestles with her diagnosis and with how and when to explain it to her beloved children. Along the way, she begins to remember what matters most: long walks with her husband’s hand firmly clasped around hers, family game nights and always buying the dress she wants. Told through brief anecdotes, each one attempts to answer the impossible questions familiar to anyone navigating grief. Warm and humorous, this extraordinary novella celebrates life while exploring love, loss and recovery. Kinsella describes it as fiction but also as her most autobiographical work to date, explaining that writing has always been her way of processing her life and turning it into a narrative. The story has been praised by Jojo Moyes, Jodi Picoult, Lisa Jewell and Jenny Colgan.