Never Greener by Ruth Jones - Book Review

You might recognise the name, Ruth Jones, not only is she one of the writers for the beloved series Gavin and Stacey, but she also acted as Nessa, the mother of baby Neal. It was about time that Ruth Jones jumped across to novel writing, but I am sure she will carry on writing scripts as well. Never Greener is her debut novel and came out in 2019. 

The novel is about Kate, who is twenty-two in the year 1985. She has an affair with a married man, Callum, who’s in his late thirties. Seventeen years later - 2002 - Kate is a successful actress and married with a child. Callum is still married to his wife, with three children, we learn pretty quickly that his wife found out about the affair but decided to stay with him. However, after nearly two decades the pair bump into each other, and what do you know, they end up rekindling their affair. Of course, any reader can tell that they will be found out, and they are and end up staying together, but it is not all that it seems to be. 

When finishing this book, I thought, alright that was expected, but the more I look back at the book I realise how much I actually enjoyed it. 

Ruth Jones took a risk making the protagonist a cheater, automatically we are made to hate her because not only does Kate nearly destroy a marriage when she’s younger, she then ends up cheating on her husband later. But for some reason, I still liked her, not loved, but Kate is a very complex character, and Ruth Jones adding different layers to her makes Kate a very realistic character and I really love that. 

I also really enjoy the ending, it’s happy but not in the sloppy way that they all end up back with one another. The last chapter is set in 2017, and Kate has worked on her many issues and her child is finally graduating from university and it’s nice to see them all get along. Whereas Callum and his ex-wife stay as friends and are grandparents. 

There were a few areas that I didn’t really enjoy. 

This is very picky, but the writing style I didn’t really like. There were a lot of short sentences, and it just breaks the flow a lot of the time. Having short sentences is alright, but they have to be used correctly and not all the time, just like long sentences, they are great to use, but not all the time. 

There was just one cliche part that I didn’t really like. Spoiler, continue if you want but I will ruin it for you if you do want to read it. We learn rather quickly that Kate was pregnant at the age of twenty-two, but we learn she had an abortion. From that moment, perhaps it’s because I am a writer myself but, I couldn’t help but think, she didn’t have an abortion but the baby was put up for adoption. And what do you know, Kate did exactly that. Cliches can be fine if there is a little twist and the author makes it their own. 

Overall, I did actually like this book, it wasn’t my favourite but definitely not the worse book I have read. I can honestly say, that if I see another book by Ruth Jones in a book shop, I will most likely buy it and read it, and of course, review it.