This is truly a testament to the bravery, intelligence and determination of Gavanndra to be the person she could be, not the person she might have been given her family influences. Although the death of younger sister Candy is a trigger for the breakdown of normal rules of bringing up children, it is not the whole story. The family is fragile. Dad is a drug dealer, Mum is an alcoholic, upbringing children was never going to be normal but all standards really plummet and Gavanndra is given alcohol, drugs, a total lack of guidelines or parenting, cast adrift in a very dangerous sea. She swims, just, but along the way represses all her memories of that awful day when Candy dies. This memoir is how she tries to restore her memories of her sister, revisits her past, condemns her father but still loves him totally. It is very honest, shocking, hopeful, well worth reading.

Interesting read on how the events and traumas we experience as children can affect our lives into adulthood.

Quite a hard read with lots of alcohol/drug abuse.
A sad story of how a young child’s life has been affected by the loss of her sister, her alcoholic mother and drug dependent father.
Also explores the relationship she has with her parents and how their memories of the same events differ.

A compelling read about the power of early childhood trauma and grief to have an impact for years to come. Coupled with a chaotic upbringing, it's hard to imagine that this could be the transformative book that it turns out to be. But it is. Well-written and bringing into your own life the characters who formed the life of the author, it's a hard one to put down.

Gavanndra Hodge's style and understanding of herself, her parents and the family dynamics made this a compelling read. She described her family life without making excuses and especially her relationship with her father - who she loves dearly. She also finds her anger towards him overpowering at times.

Her childhood included dealing with her father's drug addition, her mother's alcoholism and the unexpected death of her 9 year old sister on holiday. She copes with the neglect, loss and grief in ways that hurt her and those around her. She also knows her parents love her but have their own demons to fight.

This memoir will remind you that most families and childhoods have their challenges, Gavanndra Hodge's telling gives us insight into how she made it through to the other otherside and it's an engaging read.

I thoroughly enjoyed this book and couldn’t wait to pick it up at every opportunity. It sounds strange saying that due to the nature of the issues raised. Who would be excited to hear about someone else’s difficult upbringing? However, somehow the writing style really draws the reader in. Although these are extremely sad circumstances and experiences to live through, Gavanndra manages to make the reader feel at ease. I am definitely going to be recommending this book to family, friends & my book club. Thank you for the opportunity to read this beautiful book in exchange for an honest review.

An incredible story, told with sensitivity and honesty. I can honestly say I haven't read a memoir this entrancing in a long time. Thank you for your honesty Ms Hodge.

I couldn't put this book down. Such a powerful memoir, that demonstrates how writing can literally change the course of one's own life. A heartbreaking story of edifying content, with larger-than-life characters and a beautiful ending filled with solace and hope. Empathetic, painstakingly honest and luminous, this is narrative non-fiction at its best.

An exceptional memoir that hardly puts a foot wrong. Gavanndra (named after her dad, a drug-dealing, heroin-loving hairdresser) had a glamorous childhood in restaurants on the King’s Road, and as an adult has a successful career in journalism for the ES and Tatler. However she has not managed to face up to the unexpected death of her little sister when they were children. This is the story of her journey of remembering her sister and later rev onnecting with her half-sister and niece. This is an absolutely stunning read, brilliant on the many complications of trying to love an addict and cling on to the few good choices you’ve made amid the chaos (in Gavanndra’s case, her university studies). I wonder if she will write any more- perhaps a novel? She certainly has the skill.

This autobiography by Gavanndra Hodge is so harrowing to read. Brought up in a posh area of London by alcoholic, drug-taking parents it certainly pulls no punches in the descriptions of how selfish some parents can be.
During a holiday to Tunisia her young sister contracts a deadly virus and dies. Gavanndra as an adult remembers the death but little more about her sister. The book follows her quest to find out more
I enjoyed the book, if enjoy is the right way to describe such a subject. But I felt that we never got to the bottom of why she didn't remember her sister. I can only conclude that the shenanigans of her truly awful childhood caused her brain to somehow block parts of her life out..
Written in a very readable style, I read it in two sittings. Thanks to Netgalley for the chance to read.

Gavanndra Hodge is the daughter of a drug-dealing Chelsea hairdresser and an alcoholic model. Her younger sister, Candy, died when young, but Hodge has no memories of her, other than the moments surrounding her death.

This memoir is Hodge’s attempt to remember her beloved sister.

Hodge has an accessible writing style. Her memoir places the reader in a dilemma: the parents’ world is, on the surface, glamorous. Her father is charismatic and her mother beautiful. Underneath, however, is neglect and squalor, and young Gavanndra forced to grow up fast. Unfortunately, Hodge fails to engage when writing about the ugly underbelly of the drug lifestyle, holding the reader at a remove. The dichotomy results in an uncomfortable feeling of voyeurism.

My thanks to NetGalley and Penguin UK - Michael Joseph for the ARC.

Thank you for the opportunity to read Gavanndra Hodge's 'The Consequences of Love'. This is a heart-breaking story of an adolescent girl who experiences the loss of her younger sister while growing up in the drug culture of London in the 1980s and 90s. I was fascinated to read Gavanndra's story, particularly as I know the school she went to and I realise how different her family situation must have been to just about every other student's. It is a testament to Gavanndra's resilience and strength of character that she was able to study at university, develop a successful career and find love with a partner and children.

The Consequences of Love by Gavanndra Hodge is about a childhood full of trauma and how she survived it.

Gavvandra Hodge is the now adult daughter of a drug-dealer and an ex-model.
This powerful memoir is about the death of her sister Candy as a child and Hodge’s difficulty remembering her, but also about the nature of family and how we make and re-make memories out of the blanks caused by trauma.
Hodge’s father looms - a larger than life figure whom Hodge both loves and finds exasperating.
Told at different points in her life, we learn how Hodge takes on her trauma and comes out fighting.
A mother herself, she starts to heal through discovering her long-buried memories.
She’s a good writer and I was drawn into the rarefied but desperate world of druggie Chelsea in the 1990s - her father’s world.
Recommended: a compelling memoir that’s surprisingly complex.

In ‘The Consequences of Love’ Gavanndra Hodge has written an incredibly moving and life-affirming memoir about her life and her little sister’s death. It is an exploration of why, for most of her life so far, she was unable to remember her much-loved Candy, and what this tells us about her own chaotic childhood and adolescence. Perhaps only as she grew into her adult self – a successful career woman, a wife in a stable marriage and a mother of two adored daughters – did she feel safe enough to acknowledge that there was a Candy-shaped hole in her life.
The author delves into, exposes and unpicks her reminiscences and structures the doing of this in such a way that the prose presents itself as a series of connected dream-like memories. Hodge writes superbly and she never shies away from the often unpalatable truth. The description of primary school Gavanndra forcing herself to stay awake until late at night, feeling the weight of responsibility as safekeeper of the family home, is shocking but never self-pitying. Sitting amongst the stoned junkies in her sitting room, their heroin supplied by her father, she blows out candles and stubs out joints before finally giving herself permission to sleep. It is heart-breaking.
Unsurprisingly, in some respects she is a rebellious teenager. At fifteen she is drinking plenty and taking drugs supplied by father Gavin as he ogles her friends and makes inappropriate jokes. And yet, miraculously, she forgives her parents for their negligence; she studies hard and gains a place at Cambridge; she becomes a successful journalist.
Whilst this is a book about rediscovering Candy as the effects of the traumatic death catch up with the writer, it is also a memoir in which she shines a light up to her mother and father, the former often ignored and the latter once adored. There is anger as she looks at her family through adult eyes and the perspective of time and yet she can also forgive, treasure and accept. In short, what she feels comes from the consequences of love. This is a book which will appeal to anyone interested in fallible families, buried grief, and terrible loss. Yet, it is also an incredibly life-affirming read. This brave woman not only survives but she learns to name and live with her sorrows whilst celebrating all that is good about her life.
My thanks to NetGalley and Penguin UK Michael Joseph for a copy of this novel in exchange for a fair review.