You Never Told Me by Sarah Jasmon | @sarahontheboat @TransworldBooks @damppebbles

Welcome to my stop on the blog tour for You Never Told Me by Sarah Jasmon! My thanks to Emma at damppebbles for the invitation to join. I have an extract to share with you all today but first, let’s take a look at what this book is all about.

Author : Sarah Jasmon
Title : You Never Told Me
Pages : 384
Publisher : Transworld
Publication date : March 19, 2020

| ABOUT THE BOOK |

A year ago, Charlie’s life seemed to be following a plan: she had a beautiful house, a lovable dog and an upcoming wedding. But she felt trapped. A few months before the big day, ignoring the warnings from her family, she abandoned her life and fled to the other side of the world in a bid for freedom.

But when her mother unexpectedly falls ill, Charlie has to cut her trip short. She flies home, but by the time she gets to the hospital, it’s too late.

Her mother is gone, but she’s left a mystery behind. Why did she buy a canal boat, and where did the money for it come from? As Charlie attempts to work through her grief and pick up the pieces of her life, she follows the threads of her mother’s secret past – but has she missed her chance to learn the truth?

| EXTRACT |

A different nurse came around the edge of the curtain. Seeing Charlie, she made as if to back away. Then she stopped.

‘Everything all right, my love?’ she asked.

Charlie made an effort to concentrate. Maybe it was jetlag starting to kick in, but she felt as if her head had no connection with her body, or with her surroundings.

‘Yes, sorry,’ she said, and found herself smiling to reassure the nurse. She was only young, probably the age of most of the backpackers Charlie had spent the last few months with.

‘I’m just—’ She gestured back to the bed. What was she doing? What was she supposed to be doing?

‘Just ask if you need anything,’ the girl said, and hurried off in her squishy white shoes.

Charlie dropped into the single chair that was squeezed between the bed and the curtain. Just ask if there was anything she needed. What she needed was for this not to be happening, for someone to tell her she could wake up now. She wasn’t ready, she didn’t know what to do. Should she hold her mother’s hand, tell her how sorry she was that this had happened? Apologize for not being in touch, for moving away, for always wanting her to be a different sort of mother? Nothing felt right.

Max would know. She imagined him being next to her, a bulwark against the strangeness. He would hold her and reassure her that what she was feeling was normal, that she didn’t need to worry about some imagined standard of behaviour she was failing to meet. For a moment it seemed possible, that she could call him and he’d drop everything. He might do that: he was a kind man and he had loved her. But it didn’t seem to be playing fair to call on him just because she was in need.

The words from one of their final conversations kept popping up in her head. You know if you leave, that’s going to be it? I’ll go with you anywhere, try anything, but if you go, you go. His voice had broken at that point, tears running down his cheeks. You can’t leave me and still have me, you know that?

‘What do you really think about it all?’ Charlie spoke without thinking in the end, the words surprising her. Somehow, her hand had reached out, resting itself lightly on her mother’s arm. It lay still and straight, resting on the laundry stamp of the hospital sheet, warmer than Charlie expected her to be. It really was as if she was lying there, listening to her speak. A moment of intimacy, the last chance to talk. Except they’d never sat together like this, not really. Charlie tried to remember the last time they’d talked, just the two of them, and her grip tightened.

She’d left it too late. Numbly, she sat on in silence, with every minute taking her mother further away. Gravity pulled at skin and muscle, leaving her mouth slack and lop- sided.

There was nothing Charlie could do.

But Charlie’s mother has left a mystery behind and if you’d like to find out what that is, then you can grab yourself a copy of You Never Told Me when it publishes on Thursday or pre-order it right now!

| ABOUT THE AUTHOR |

Sarah Jasmon lives on a canal boat near Manchester with her children. She has had several short stories published, is curating a poetry anthology, and has recently graduated from the Creative Writing MA course at Manchester Metropolitan University. To find out more, visit www.sarahjasmon.com

Twitter: https://twitter.com/sarahontheboat
Website: https://sarahjasmon.com/
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