Jo Walton

Remembering two different pasts that reflect contrasting historical events and relationships with different people, an elderly Patricia Cowan wonders about her identity while gazing at a moon that might house benign or malicious technologies. By the Hugo Award-winning author of Among Others. 25,000 first printing.

My Real Children

The day Mark called, Patricia Cowan’s world split in two. The phone call. His question. Her answer. A single word. ‘Yes.’ ‘No.’ It is 2015 and Patricia Cowan is very old. ‘Confused today’ read the notes clipped to the end of her bed. Her childhood, her years at Oxford during the Second World War – those things are solid in her memory. Then that phone call and...her memory splits in two. She was Trish, a housewife and mother of four. She was Pat, a successful travel writer and mother of three. She remembers living her life as both women, so very clearly. Which memory is real – or are both just tricks of time and light? My Real Children is the story of both of Patricia Cowan’s lives – each with its loves and losses, sorrows and triumphs, its possible consequences. It is a novel about how every life means the entire world.

Janice Hopper

I enjoyed this book very much. I couldn't help but think about Terry Pratchett and going down one or the other legs of the trousers of time, though. :) In my world, that's a good thing.

In this story, the Trousers of Time divide at one particular decision made by the main character. We then see the two different directions her life went based on that decision.

Very well written. I read most of it in one sitting. I agree the ending is a bit weak, but how many of us have a Big Finish at the ends of our ordinary lives?

Good stuff.

Andrea McGuffey

Steven O'Toole

It's 2015, and Patricia Cowan is very old. "Confused today," read the notes clipped to the end of her bed. She forgets things she should know-what year it is, major events in the lives of her children. But she remembers things that don't seem possible. She remembers marrying Mark and having four children. And she remembers not marrying Mark and raising three children with Bee instead. She remembers the bomb that killed President Kennedy in 1963, and she remembers Kennedy in 1964, declining to run again after the nuclear exchange that took out Miami and Kiev. Her childhood, her years at Oxford during the Second World War-those were solid things. But after that, did she marry Mark or not? Did her friends all call her Trish, or Pat? Had she been a housewife who escaped a terrible marriage after her children were grown, or a successful travel writer with homes in Britain and Italy? And the moon outside her window: does it host a benign research station, or a command post bristling with nuclear missiles? Two lives, two worlds, two versions of modern history; each with their loves and losses, their sorrows and triumphs. Jo Walton's My Real Children is the tale of both of Patricia Cowan's lives...and of how every life means the entire world.

My Real Children

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