Grace has a plan in life: revenge. I'm not here to criticise that, her father is awful and her family are all assholes; you go, girl! But good revenge needs a smart way to be accomplished. There's no two ways about it, Grace, the protagonist of this story isn't a nice person. And yet, I still found myself really liking her as a character. She is brutally honest, incredibly vengeful and darkly comical and we as the reader get front row seats to her innermost thoughts and feelings told through her life story written while serving time in prison for a crime she, ironically, didn't actually commit. I thought the premise was fantastic and I really enjoyed reading as Grace executed her cunning plans as well as her musings on all manner of subjects including wealth, class and even influencers. The narrative is generally really sharp and clever although at times Grace's story is interrupted by the present day so at times I could understand why people found this to be a bit of a ramble. I didn't actually mind this as it felt more realistic for me personally. After all, whose thoughts are ever organised? Harriet Bourton, publisher, pre-empted world rights in a major deal for T he Best Way to Bury Your Husband and one other untitled novel from Kristina Pérez at Zeno Agency. The Best Way to Bury Your Husband will be published as a lead title in February 2024.

Funny and furious and strangely uplifting. Grace is a bitter and beguiling anti-hero with a keen eye for social analysis – even in her most grisly deeds, you never stop rooting for her’ PANDORA SYKES Take the plot of the Ealing film classic Kind Hearts of Coronets. Make your central character an anti-hero assassin in the vein of Villanelle from Killing Eve. Add in a lot of snarky comments about twenty-first century life and you get the essence of How to Kill Your Family. one of the main themes of the book was about class, but it wasn’t really discussed in any profound way, and it actually became quite trite after a while. basically the whole book involved snipes at the rich/the upper classes (which i’m usually all here for) but THEN i discovered that the author of this book is alan rusbridger’s daughter and her grandfather is a baron….so she clearly moves in some privileged social circles herself, not exactly a working class hero. after that little discovery, the constant digs at privileged white people prompted a few eye rolls from me. Grace Bernard is in Limehouse Prison serving a sentence for a crime she didn’t commit but that doesn’t mean to say she hasn’t committed some! To relieve the boredom and the inane chatter of cell mate Kelly she decides to write her astonishing story. This tell all explains exactly what she is guilty of! This is a novel about rejection and betrayal, revenge and retribution. There’s no real drama. No point at which she is almost caught in the act which would have come as a welcome intermission.

Children’s book of the week

Amidst the chaos of the calculated revenge plot are flashes of humour and Grace’s hilarious but true observations about the mundanity and bizarreness of life. It is a surprisingly uplifting story in places and while I never felt that her victims deserved their ultimate fates, Grace’s certainty and confidence was almost able to convince me of the necessity of her deeds. Ironically, Grace was in jail for a murder she did not commit, yet she was never charged for the multiple murders that she did commit.

Grace Bernard is a thoroughly unlikeable person. Single-minded to the point of obsession about her plan to exact revenge, she freely exploits other people’s vulnerabilities to get what she needs. .Not only that, but the plot felt kind of weak. There were so many weak points in the murders she committed. At one point I wondered if there had been witnesses, and it turns out THERE WAS. Okay, this is going under a spoiler tag, but yeah, apparently her secret half brother had been following her all along, and she never noticed because she's an idiot. She thinks she's being so secretive, and yet carries out at least three of the murders with witnesses. And then she does the incredibly stupid thing of writing out her confession in prison where her cellmate can read it (AND DOES). It's just so stupid. Those who hated the ending are forgetting how ridiculously silly Grace was for not thinking of these things. She plans with extreme precision and executes these plans with ease and no regrets. It is only on reflection that I realise just how vile her deeds were. While I was absorbed in her world, the violence and immorality of her acts was camouflaged by her planning, precision and rationalisation. Casale added: “Every few hours I suddenly remember that Harriet is my editor and Viking is my publisher and it’s not just an amazing daydream. Harriet’s pitch captured everything I want this novel to be; from the start, she and the whole wonderful Viking team have embraced me and the women in the book with all the solidarity that lies at the heart of the story. I can’t imagine better partners in bringing the book to readers and hopefully becoming one more voice in the fight to change the endemic nature of male violence against women and girls.

I thought from the opening couple of chapters that I was about to be proved wrong. How to Kill Your Family had a strong narrative voice and some amusingly cynical comments about the empty lives of rich people. But it went downhill rapidly.

The ending broke my heart a little, but I didn’t feel like it affected my enjoyment of the book at all. In fact, I found myself racing to the end to digest all the information. The plague of these past years - if we exclude the pandemic, obviously - is the publishing industry’s obsession with creating a good-looking cover. Because you shouldn't judge a book by its cover, but everybody does that ‘cause the cover is always a big deal! Maybe if I can make people laugh, they’ll also listen—ideally to women with more practical ideas about how to change the world than handing out antique skillets and shovels.”

HOW TO KILL YOUR FAMILY takes the proverbial saying "Don't get mad, get even" to exciting new levels. The story follows Grace’s plan to kill her family, for crimes committed against both her mother and herself. I didn’t find the reasoning for the vendetta totally compelling, but as the book progressed, I felt it actually didn’t matter. It was really fun following her process - doing the research, plotting the death and then carrying it out. It’s not always straightforward (it would be a dull story if it was) but it’s quite the wild ride. How unfair that she finds herself as a prisoner when nobody knows the crimes she actually committed...and why she killed those folks. When I think about what I actually did, I feel somewhat sad that nobody will ever know about the complex operation that I undertook. Getting away with it is highly preferable, of course, but perhaps when I’m long gone, someone will open an old safe and find this confession. The public would reel. After all, almost nobody else in the world can possibly understand how someone, by the tender age of 28, can have calmly killed six members of her family. And then happily got on with the rest of her life, never to regret a thing.Yes, this book is truly in a league of its own. It's chilling and disturbing; yet, also LOL humorous. When Grace discovers her bio dad, a millionaire, rejected her and her dying mother, she decides to enact her revenge by killing the entire family. Yet, in a strange twist of fate, she is convicted and sent to prison for the one murder she DIDN’T commit. I highly recommend it if you’re looking for an original and sometimes outrageously entertaining story, but be advised this is definitely an ‘R’-rated read.