The Inconvenient Need to Belong

I absolutely cannot believe this is a debut novel. It is absolutely superb. The author is able to seamlessly move from past to present in a way that really keeps you engaged in the book. 
The ending of this one has been a complete surprise which is always welcome. I have absolutely adored Alfie's story, he is such a likeable character. 
I am definitely a fan of this author, I have been pulled into this one and found that it has been difficult to put down. Her writing style is fantastic and has really kept my attention. I absolutely cannot wait to read more by this author.
This is without a doubt a five star read.

A story told in two time lines of a carefree youngster Alfie in 1953 England and then moving to his late eighties living out his days in a care home.

Cantankerous now, keeping everyone out, socially inept Alfie has not changed especially the social part. Brought up by a strict dominant father whose word was law and who was to be feared, whose mother just followed his father's orders, the only person he loved was his sister Betty. But to get out from these suffocating circumstances, he crept out in the dead of the night and a reconciliation was never possible.

Now Alfie reminisces about his past with Fred a youngster who joins him on Saturday mornings on a park bench. Alfie sees in Fred a younger version of himself and gives an account of how his life panned out hoping that Fred will not make the mistakes he made. Befriending Anne on a pen pal site was a way of reaching out of his solitude and putting to paper what he has bottled up for decades.

I seem to be reading a lot of stories of people who are loners, who are socially not upto fitting into groups in a casual way and as a result are thought to be arrogant, evasive and just difficult. Alfie fits all the descriptions of being a cantankerous old man, whilst deep down he is just lonely and someone who has never got around to not being judgemental and to accept people as they are.

This was an eye opener of a read for older people - to live and let live, to realize that the end is closer than one thinks.

Alfie is a resident in a care home, he really doesn’t like other people and he’s a grumpy loner. But, every Saturday he sneaks out and visits a local park to feed the ducks. Here he meets Fred, a young man and Alfie starts to tell his story….

Alfie left his home, parents and sisters in London in the middle of the night, he needed to make a life of his own. At the toss of a coin he arrives in Exeter.

It’s here he meets Grace, but when things don’t go as he dreamed, he turns to drink…

He runs away and joins a travelling funfair and life is good…….but will he stay sober?

This is a tale of a lonely man….as an old man he’s looking back at his life and how his behaviour has left him alone. It is about love, loss, guilt and regrets.

I found the detail as of life in a care home heartbreaking, the monotony and loneliness just so realistic…( my mum is a resident of a lovely care home, but is bed ridden and days are spent alone in a room with only a tv for company….apart from her wild adventures in her mind due to dementia).

Alfie is a complex, troubled man and I really felt for him…..

A beautifully written story that I couldn’t put down. I loved every emotion packed moment.

Thank you to The author, the publishers and NetGalley for an eARC of the book. This is my honest, unbiased review.

The Inconvenient Need To Belong ⭐⭐⭐⭐/5

Today is my stop on the blog tour thanks to @annecater14 for organising and having me on the tour.

What a heartwarming tale. Really uplifting. So beautifully written. This book explores the loneliness of life along with growing old.

In 1953 Alfie ran away from a troubled childhood to begin a new life for himself in Exeter.

Meet Alfie now. Age 86. Living a lonely and grumpy life in a care home. To add some excitement and escapism Alfie sneaks out every week to feed the ducks. Looking at his younger days and struggling to accept his past. This is the story of loneliness, regret and emotion.

If your a fan of books featuring #pensionersinthepages then I can't recommend this one enough.

This book is an absolute read. If you are one of those people who feel like missing something in their life, I'm sure this story will resonate with the unexplainable void cast in your heart. When I started reading the book I mistook the story to be incredible plain and boring (first three pages I guess, I know that was pretty hasty of me to reach that conclusion, but I am mentioning it so that you don't quit reading just by finding some first pages boring). But as it progressed it got a lot more interesting.
It is a story of regrets, wrong choices and teaches you to cherish your youth. I liked the character of Alfie Cooper the protagonist and the narrator. He is in his 80s without any children or kin to call his own, he lives in Pinewood Care Home for the Elderly in a small English town, he knows that his life is results of his wrong choices and somehow he keeps on regretting those. The only things that interest him in his monochromatic routined life are his bird motel (a stolen ashtray from his roommate) his weekly library visits and his sneak-out to nearby parks on Saturdays. I often pitied Alfie for his lonely and monotoned life and it is sad to know how his life turned out to be.
The story is beautifully orchestrated and narrated in second person POV. The early 50s landscapes, culture and lifestyle are well described in the story.

I must like to add this book is The Notebook without Allie in it.

Overall very interesting read.

This book was a moving book to read. I felt such loss and sadness for Alfie, both when he was younger and when he was older. I enjoyed the manner in which the book was written, with one narrator but two timelines. They were woven together well so the story progressed nicely and there was no confusion. While the book was not overly descriptive I found myself sitting in the seniors home with Alfie and the other residents. The ending had a nice unexpected twist. I found myself thinking of my mother and other seniors and wondering what exactly their lives had been like when they were 20 and 30, the time that most of us know nothing about. These were the years when so many things happen to people but as senior citizens we don’t think of them as young. I believe you will enjoy this book and it will leave you thinking differently about the senior citizens in your life. There were a few parts in the book that didn’t really seem to make a difference in the story but they didn’t detract too much from the book. I thank NetGalley and Books Go Social for the chance to read this lovely novel.

An uplifting, beautifully written tale!

I really enjoyed how Smedley wove together Alfie's present-day and his past, she reels you in so seamlessly I sat and read the whole book in one sitting.

It just missed out on 5⭐the ending felt very abrupt to me and I wanted more Alfie, hopefully, we hear from him again soon!

Overall, a moving debut with engaging characters that are hard to leave behind. Perfect for fans of The Hundred Year Old Man Who Climbed Out of the Window and Disappeared.

A huge thanks to Anne Cater & SilverWood Books for sending me a copy in return for an open & honest review.

⭐⭐⭐⭐

A bittersweet story that flicks tantalisingly between two timelines. Alfie, has a story to tell, one which twists and turns: a man with a deeply troubling past. This is a story which has to be told, and as a reader I was desperate to know what he was hiding. The irascible old man has regrets and shame which he has carried with him for his whole life and has resulted in a lonely residency in a home. An interesting story-telling relationship develops between him and a young man, who he meets in the park each Saturday, which is the only time Alfie 'escapes' the home he lives in (by sneaking out!). There is a sense that Alfie is hoping that someone can learn from his mistakes, if only he can ring himself to reveal them. The self-restraint he demonstrates when sharing his past life, appears to be one of the few things that Alfie is now able to control.
The picture of Alfie's 'retired' life is bleak, but one which he seems to feel he deserves as a result of past mistakes he had made.
I was captivated by his adventures as a young man, and found myself truly frustrated and surprised at the end of each young Alfie chapter when I was catapulted into a modern setting. The contrast between his early adulthood and his current life are stark and only as his story draws to an end do you learn the reasons for this.

Thank you to NetGalley, Paula Smedley, and BooksGoSocial for allowing me read this ARC in return for an honest review.
I found this book after the publication date, and am really glad I did. As a senior citizen, I often think about my past, my future, and what things will happen to me as I grow older. I enjoyed meeting Alfie and traveling with him from his youth to present day, around age 86. As a young man, he felt stifled, like most young boys, and sets out to find his dream. Things were good for him for awhile, then life happened. We don’t always get to choose our future. Sometimes, the past creeps back in to slow us down. This is a delightful story about discovering your best life and the love of family and friends.

Really good read. Would recommend to friends and family. I could sympathise with characters (important for any fiction novel!) and looked forward to picking it up and reading the next few chapters! Interesting plot line and a good ending. Will look out for more novels by the author. Thank you.

I need to confess that the first thing that caught my attention was the title of this book. We all know that the human being is the kind of animal that needs to be in contact with others from the same species, therefore we have a need to belong, which can be pretty inconvenient sometimes, so, well, in some days, we can relate to a title so strong like that.

When I stared to read this book, I immediately fell in love with the lonely eighty-six-year-old Alfie. He had so much to say and no one to talk to but a teenage boy who he kept meeting at the park every saturday.

At first I didn't want to dig in Alfie's past. I thought it was much more fun to read about him struggling with his on moodiness at the care home, towards everything and nothing at the same time. But as I kept reading, I wanted to know more and more about his past and how that shaped him, without a family, without friends, without a support.

I love how the author dropped hints about Alfie's story little by little, in the past or in the present, it was so smart and it kept me wondering what had happened. I did think the end was a bit fast, at least faster than the pace of the rest of the book, but it's still an amazing read.

I'm really glad I got the chance to dive into this story, into Alfie's past and present. It's a great book to think that our actions have consequences and that we may think life is short, but we still get old and what we do when we're young reflects on who ourselves later on.

This review was also posted on Goodreads.

This novel packs an emotional punch.
I really love reading books with older characters as I feel like they give you the feeling of talking to your grandparents - a whimsical wise narrative of life.
Alfie is very grumpy and has isolated himself for many years, but he was likeable and he broke my heart many times.
I enjoyed how his life was revealed to the reader by his conversations with the guy he meets every week, as you could really imagine being apart of this conversation yourself.
Overall it broke my heart but left me thinking about it long after I finished the last page.

A heartbreakingly sad book about loneliness, regret and the bad consequences of childhood insecurities .
There are times of hope and possible happiness in Alfie's life but he seems not to have the coping skills to engage properly in life and make the most of the opportunities he opens up.
I love the contrast between the old Alfie and the young vibrant Alfie and the themes of loneliness and also unexpected friendships.
A very good read but melancholy and sad too.

Thanks to netgalley for the arc.

I enjoy reading books when one or more of the main characters are of the older generation. I was attracted to this book because of that fact. The main character Alfie Cooper is an 86 year old living in Pinewood Care Home for the Aged Residents. In the US, this would be equivalent to an assisted living faculty. It’s very interesting to meet the other people in this care home. Some are annoying, some are very lively and then there is Alfie, who keeps to himself and is pretty much a grump all the time.

Viewing these elderly residents on the surface, you would take them just as they present themselves and not think about what happened in their prior life that influenced who they are now in their later years. This book tells the story of Alfie’s life. The reader comes to understand the experiences which shaped his life. Some people overcome their difficulties and some make the difficulties an excuse for how their life unfolds.

This is a debut novel by Paula Smedley. I liked her writing style. She did a great job of developing her characters. The plot is believable. I personally did not like the ending of the book. After reading Alfie’s life in meticulous detail, the ending seemed to very rushed and over before I fully realized it was ending. (I read the eBook and did not focus on the percent read.)

Also, I want to mention I disliked the undercurrent of the author’s opinion on the politics in the US. (This is a small part of the book, but I want to express my feelings.) This comes through in a character’s voice, but I could have done without this subject in the book. I read to escape real life and I was surprised to be reading comments about politics. A quote from this book “My own daddy always told me that you don’t discuss politics or religion”. I wish the book held to that statement. If I want to read opinions of US politics, I am sure I could find many books on that subject.

I want to thank NetGalley and BooksGoSocial for allowing me to read the advanced reader copy. My review is my own opinion not influenced by receiving the ARC.

The inconvenient Need To Belong is the book of Alfie’s life. We meet him in later life, in his 80’s, living in Pinewood Retirement home. Pinewood is not a great retirement home, a sad reflection on how some our elderly find the last years of their lives.
Through his regular Saturday chats with a young lad called Fred, we start to learn of Alfie’s younger life. Alfie is determined to share his life with his young friend, so he can learn from the older man’s mistakes. We learn how, in 1953, he left his oppressive and controlled upbringing. With the optimism of youth in his heart, a spring in his step, and all of his dreams for his future bursting through, sometimes too enthusiastically.
We know from Alfie’s current life, that he has closed himself off from forming any attachments. There is obviously something that has made him so curmudgeonly, something very deeply rooted. We can feel his regret, and have a sense that he feels he doesn’t deserve a happy life.
The book is the story of getting to know Alfie. I felt that the end of the book, the culmination of what we had been working up to, was a little rushed.
For this reason, it’s a 4* from me.

Alfie’s story is beautifully written and captures your attention from the start. It draws you in. His story is one about the complexity and beauty of relationships, about mistakes and regrets, and about the challenge we all face of finding your place in the world.

This was a really good book, I recomend it. This book was very well constructed. Although the characters weren't likable, you can't help yourself but feel for them. The end was a little bit rushed. I think this book portrayed the feeling of lonelyness very well.

Many thanks to Netgalley and publishers for providing my review copy.
Alfie had such an interesting life and I found the transitions back and for to really tie everything together. It was a bit slow in parts so I think it could have been a little shorter.

A great debut novel
It is very beautifully written. The book touches on loneliness
It is a nice and easy book to read. It’s nothing too complex.