I received an ARC of this book in return for an honest review.

The Possible World by Liese O’Halloran Schwarz is a beautifully written, heart-wrenching novel that kept me captivated from start to finish. This book was a true page-turner, rich in memorable characters whose lives intertwine in profound ways, each bringing their unique perspective and depth to the story. Schwarz’s exquisite prose offers delicate and powerful observations on the simplest aspects of life, making each moment feel intensely human and relatable. With emotional resonance and raw beauty, this novel explores loss, love, and resilience, making it both a heartbreaking and uplifting experience. Highly recommended for anyone seeking a story that lingers long after the last page.

This is a beautifully written book and I regret every minute that I've spent without this story in my life.

There are three main characters here with five main storylines which intertwine cleverly to bring the protagonists together. There are moments of happiness and moments of heartbreak, all of it narrated expertly.

I've not read anything by this author before but I'm sure I will return to her writing.

Oh, I just loved loved loved loooooved this book. Funny that, because crime is not my favorite genre. And at first it seems this is just a crime novel. But I’d be terribly irresponsible to let that notion fester. The Possible World does indeed begin with a heinous crime, but the story encompasses the journey of three lives, beautifully woven together.
Ben is a six-year-old boy who is the lone survivor of a multiple murder scene that included the death of his mother. What started out as a birthday party ends in trauma as he is whisked to the emergency room. Here he is first seen by the resident doctor, Lucy. She doesn’t spend too much time with Ben before he is taken to Psych for an evaluation. But Lucy’s life and Ben’s slowly become intertwined.
Ben is unable to remember anything, nor who he is, as he tells everyone he is Leo. But as Leo, he has stories aplenty that somehow mesh the past with the present.
Lucy, meanwhile, is going through upheaval in her own personal life. Yet she is drawn to Ben, especially as she learns more about his life and the stories he shares.
Finally, we have Clare. At 100, she decides it is time to share and record her own story, one that will weave together the lives of these characters. Indeed, in the final chapters, when I realized what was happening, I wanted more. I mourned how the story was about to end, and I proceeded to tell all my friends to read it so I could discuss the possibilities with someone!
Because in this story is a possible phenomenon that I’ve read about before (no spoilers) and I could not wait to discuss this with others. How the author depicts the lives of these three individuals is breathtaking and mesmerizing. And the possibility of what actually happened? Book clubs aplenty will have much to process.

I am in charge of the senior library and work with a group of Reading Ambassadors from 16-18 to ensure that our boarding school library is modernised and meets the need of both our senior students and staff. It has been great to have the chance to talk about these books with our seniors and discuss what they want and need on their shelves. I was drawn to his book because I thought it would be something different from the usual school library fare and draw the students in with a tempting storyline and lots to discuss.
This book was a really enjoyable read with strong characters and a real sense of time and place. I enjoyed the ways that it maintained a cracking pace that kept me turning its pages and ensured that I had much to discuss with them after finishing. It was not only a lively and enjoyable novel but had lots of contemporary themes for our book group to pick up and spend hours discussing too.
I think it's important to choose books that interest as well as challenge our students and I can see this book being very popular with students and staff alike; this will be an excellent purchase as it has everything that we look for in a great read - a tempting premise, fantastic characters and a plot that keeps you gripped until you close its final page.

The story for this novel revolves around three main characters: the elderly Clare who lives in a care home; Lucy, an ER doctor who handles an assortment of emergency hospital trauma admissions; and Ben, who insists his name is Leo, and who's in third grade at school even though he's a year younger than all his classmates.

Ben/Leo is the only survivor of a horrendous multiple homicide incident, and he is retained in hospital where he comes to the attention of Lucy who is struggling with personal issues outside of work. Meanwhile, Clare spends her time reminiscing about her past to a fellow resident in her care home.

At first, these three individuals appear to be totally disconnected, and it was only around the 50% mark when I began to understand how their lives are interconnected.

I empathized with Clare's plight, and her situation drew me effectively into her world, and the chapters devoted to her point of view were the highlight for me.

Lucy's narrative was often littered with medical details and jargon. Some may find the descriptions of the medical procedures she undertakes added veracity to her character, but I soon found it monotonous and, ultimately, irrelevant.

Ben/Leo is perhaps the most intriguing character of the three. Precocious and non-communicative, his backstory stretches far beyond his tender years.

The denouement effectively ties the three plot strands together, although it is signposted for those who like to anticipate.

The prose is delightfully written and provides an easy read.

This book is one I have read and read again and I kick myself for not writing a review sooner. It was beautifully written, the style and genre perfectly matched and I could fully connect with the characters and plot.

As a text Schwarz works to provide depth to the three main characters and succeeds. If you are looking for a book you can lose yourself in, this is one for your reading lists.

Loved it from start to finish. Set over almost a century it is a remarkable story written so beautifully it just has to merit 5 stars.

I'm sure you will love it also.

DNF@30%

This is the story of 6-year old Ben, the sole survivor of a heinous crime that claims the lives of his mother, and some of his friends. But it’s also the story of Lucy and Clare, and about their lives.

This story is told in alternating chapters, told from a different character’s point of view. First we meet Ben, the little guy who’s attending a friend’s birthday party when his world is ripped apart. Next we’re introduced to Lucy, an ER doctor whose marriage has recently fallen apart. She’s also the doctor who first sees Ben when he’s brought to the hospital after the horrific crime that he’s witnessed. And lastly, we meet Clare. She’s a resident in a nursing home, very much alone in this world and who’ll be spending her hundredth birthday on her own, with no family to visit her.

Unfortunately, this book wasn’t what I was expecting and it didn’t work for me, hence I wasn’t able to carry on with it past 30%. I somewhat enjoyed the Ben and Clare chapters (although I can’t say that I was riveted by either), but the Lucy chapters didn’t work for me at all and I found that there was too much detail about the different patients she was treating and what their ailments were. That detail didn’t seem to be taking the story anywhere and I couldn’t figure out the relevance of some of these chapters. As it turns out, at the 30% mark, I actually couldn’t see where the entire story was going and there appeared to be absolutely no plot to speak of. None of the chapters actually set out a plot and each character was merely telling us about their lives. And to be perfectly honest, I was rather bored and I found it all to be rather dull. The blurb enticed me as the story seemed to have so much promise, but the engaging read that I was expecting never materialized.

Simply put, this is a book about the complex nature of human beings. It’s a book that actually doesn’t have much of a story line, nor an intricate plot. Out of the three characters, Clare was probably the most interesting, but I wasn’t invested enough in her story to keep going. Many people seem to have loved this book, and so they must have gotten something wonderful from it, but unfortunately it was lost on me. I decided to stop reading it and to move onto something with a bit more pace.

Due to the fact that I DNF this book, I won't be posting this review on social media as I normally do. Thanks to the publisher and the author for allowing me the opportunity to read and review this title. Unfortunately, this one just wasn't for me. (PS - the cover is stunning!)

The Possible World is a beautifully written book, and is another one that I think will stay with me for some time. Although it starts with three apparently separate stories, each with a character suffering their own personal heartache, the stories are cleverly weaved together as each character begins to find peace in the others as they begin to heal from their own struggles. It is a a wonderful, gentle book, despite the horrors that have been witnessed, and is one I would thoroughly recommend.

I’ve left it too long to write this review and I can’t remember any specifics about this book. I’ve rated it 5 and I distinctly remember enjoying it- I do love novels in this vein that bring together the stories of several characters that otherwise wouldn’t be intertwined.

A reread would be necessary to review this properly but I can say: definitely would recommend.

A decent contemporary story. A good relationship plot with good character dynamics but not quite enough growth/development. Would recommend.

Ben, a seven-year-old boy goes to a birthday party. A horrible event occurs at the party and ben is the lone survivor. Traumatized and terrifies, he is taken to the ER where awaits Lucy.
Lucy, an ER doctor has been recently separated from her husband and constantly feels lost and detached.
Clare in the nursing station is about to turn 100 and is full of stories from her life experiences. Stories from the past she needs to come in terms with.
Three separate characters bring three different stories but there is one feeling that prevails- grief and loss. As they work towards overcoming this sense of loss and loneliness, we readers get a story that is so engrossing and thoughtful.
‘The Possible World’ is about possibilities and the strength one needs to overcome certain tragedies. The writing might sound vague initially as there are three separate stories, but if you read a few more pages with utmost care and patience, the story comes together beautifully. The plot is emotionally powerful and very relatable. Human emotions are complex beings and this has been dealt with very well throughout the story.

This book had many threads and it took me a while to settle into it. The characters were well developed and the story well written.

The Possible World is a book that is hard to pigeonhole, which is a good thing. It is a book that focuses on three protagonists, each with their own lives and stories which slowly shows how they are each connected. The Possible World, lets us think about the human condition, about what is loneliness and how it affects people differently, and also allows us to think about what conditions make a family

The book is split between each of the characters perspectives and each chapter switches between them. The book starts when we meet Ben a six-year-old boy who is the only witness to a terrible tragedy, followed by Lisa, who is the doctor that treats Ben at the hospital. The third character is Clare, who at the start seems the most disconnected from Ben and Lisa, as Clare is a woman who is around 100 years of age, hiding who she was from the world.

Each of these characters is fascinating, whether we are learning about Clare and how she begins to open up to a new resident at her care home. Clare is also a mediation into the old being ignored and overlooked at times. Ben, while in hospital is diagnosed with Dissociative Identity Disorder, as he no longer remembers being Ben and the Doctors do not know what to do with him as he has no surviving family. Lisa’s chapters are all about working out who she wants to be and how she can achieve it. You really feel like you are going on a journey with these characters and you want something good to come out of all of their unhappiness.

This is a beautifully written story that connects all three characters naturally. I felt that you could see the ending coming, but rather than feeling contrived, the ending feels more like closure. This is a book filled with tragedy, but it is also about finding out who you are and being true to yourself. Sometimes it really is a case of finding your best life, through facing adversity and choosing your own path. This is a deeply rewarding book that really lets you get to know these characters and how they got to the present.

This was a very unusual book, with many threads that it took a while to work out how this fitted together. But fit together it did, and it became very interesting. A lot of the book was a bit depressing, but that does not detract from the story, which is well written with developed characters. It did take a while to realise it was set in the US, not the England that I thought it seemed to be. I normally avoid books to do with the paranormal, ghosts etc, but although there was an element of that, it was very nicely done and didn't annoy me at all. The ideas that evolved into this book were quite clever, and I was impressed.

The Possible World is beautiful, character driven story connection three very different people. A stressed emergency room doctor, a small orphaned boy and an elderly lady telling the story of her life. It is rich in description and whilst rooted in reality, almost has a fairy tale quality to it.

I think I need to stick to YA, as I rarely enjoy adult fiction as much. I found this a bit too deep and meditative, and not much of a focus on plot as I'd like. It's definitely a character driven story, and not a bad one, but not for me.

This book was everything that it says in the description. I found a lovely story of connections among three characters two of whom are in need of finding a way forward out of loss and grief and a third facing the past she needs to come to terms with as she reaches her 100th birthday. Having said that, I did take issue that an important element of the story was omitted from the description. I thought that it should have been honestly represented as it was something I’d want to know - in a sense what kind of story it is, before I read it. Oddly enough, I have to admit that I may not have read the book if it had been included, and odder yet I’m glad I did read it because there was so much else I liked about it.

"How she sounds; her voice brisk in the mornings, telling me to get a move on, softer in the evenings, and when she laughs I think of a brown velvet ribbon falling through the air."

Another book that I've pulled from the depths of my NetGalley 'to be read pile...' Most definitely was not disappointed! I think it also is starting to show that my New Years Resolution was to get that pile of books down from 86 to..well... 6! This is the first book that I've read by Liese O'Halloran Schwarz and I knew nothing about her as an author or the book when I first started reading.

"The way she smells. In the morning like hand cream and shampoo. She brings a different smell home with her from the hospital."

The book touched me so much that I started writing my review before I had finished - so that I could really capture those bits that made me fall in love with Liese's writing. You can absolutely tell that Liese loves her job - both her former training at medical school - and her writing. The Possible World is as accurate as it could possibly be with lots of knowledge poured into often very emotive scenes.

There are three main characters that narate throughout the book - and once you meet them - well - you'll be attached that's for sure. Lucy is the emergency room doctor, Clare is in a nursing home about to turn one hundred years old and there is a young boy who has just witnessed a multiple homicide. We see the world through everybody's eyes in equal measures, and each time it's both heart breaking and beautiful. As their lives weave together everything you thought was impossible is instantly challenged.

If you're a parent, an A & E Doctor, a trauma nurse, a surgeon, a carer in a nursing home, a teacher...if you're anyone, this book will speak to you and will teach you things about people that until now you never stopped to consider. Be ready to look at the world from very different points of views and be ready to have your own challenged.

I don't say this often about books - but this book is more than words could ever describe in a simple review...so... read it.

This book has been an absolute pleasure to read - beautifully written with wonderful descriptions and a lovely story told by moving backwards and forwards in time with Clare who is approaching her 100th birthday. The rest of the book is filled in by Leo and Lucy.
This is the sort of book that it is good to come to with no knowledge of where the story will take you. I have just spent two days of absolute pleasure following these characters who are so rounded. A heart-warming tale which I am disappointed to have finished.
I thoroughly recommend this novel.
Very many thanks to Netgalley/Liese O'Halloran Schwarz/Random House UK for a digital copy of this excellent tale. All opinions expressed are my own.