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I just finished reading this for a second time. I only do that with 5-star books and I am revising my rating accordingly. This book is wonderful!

It's the story of a marriage in peril, narrated by the husband, Douglas. He is a British biochemist - a man who is ruled by logic and scientific reason. Douglas is improbably married to Connie, an artist, who is laissez faire to the extreme. Indeed, these two could not be more polar opposites. They have a seventeen-year old son, Albie, who is of his mother's temperament with a healthy disdain of all things conventional, including his father. When Connie announces to Douglas one night that she feels their marriage has run its course and she may want to leave, Douglas insists that the family stick to a previously planned Grand Tour of Europe where he secretly hopes to win his wife and son back.

The story of the trip is interwoven brilliantly with the backstories of Douglas and Connie. Nicholls has done this masterfully - sometimes this technique can backfire and pull you out of the flow of the story, but not here. He is carefully stitching the tapestry of a marriage, of three lives.

Douglas's narration is humorous, self-deprecating and occasionally heartbreaking. This book may seem like it would be a downer, but it is not. It's life - and ultimately, it's hopeful.

Very well done - full of insight, wisdom and wry observations. Highly recommend.