'Oh, I have a book for you!' Mum says when I pop over. I've started the new year mad keen on reading again. So far I've read no less than four books, and it's only the 8th. Not bad. 'I wouldn't have read it if I'd known what it was about I don't think, but I really enjoyed it'.

'Water', by the author of 'The Boy in the Striped Pajamas' is a good read. It's also a short one - I nearly finished it in the bath in one sitting. Ironic, given the title I suppose.

The main protagonist's issue with water is double fold, concerning both an event with her daughter and her husband's crime in his role as a swimming coach. The events are teased out as she reflects on her marriage and family in an island community off the coast of Ireland - as far away as she can get from the media and people who judged her complicit in a terrible crime.

I guess you never hear the wives stories when husbands do terrible things. People speculate. How could they not have known, they ask. If only she had done something, this terrible thing would not have happened. It is her fault as much as his. I'm totally guilty of the same. How could she have lived with the man and not known the awful things he was doing?

That is what Vanessa Carvin must do on the island - come to terms with how much she is to blame for what happened. It is as hard for her as it is for me to deal with why women stay with shitty men, and what the consequences of that can be.

I generally never pick up Boyne as I think he always seems to deal with 'issues' - like he seeks them out to sell a book. A bit mean, perhaps. I've certainly enjoyed 'Water' and I wouldn't mind picking up another book of his, now I remember why exactly he's an award winning author.