Follow Here To Purchase After We Fall: A Novel


Author is Emma Kavanagh .

The publisher is Sourcs

ISBN: 9781492609193.

Four distinct voices are heard throughout this compelling novel that focuses on an airline crash. Why the airline allowed this flight to take off in bad weather is one question that needs to be answered? Thirteen people survived the crash because one flight attendant valiantly helped each of them to safety as she forgot about her own wounds and created a safety net for others. Cold, afraid, some frost bitten the fact they survived was short of a miracle. But, Cecilia, the flight attendant was not thinking about the fact that she left her husband and son and was thinking of not returning. Two-year-old Ben never realized nor did her husband Tom what her real intentions were when boarding that flight.

The plane crashes and next we learn of the murder of a young woman who appears to have disappeared at first but whose father a retired police officer insists the police look into it. Finding a splatter of blood in her apartment he does not believe that she disappeared on her own. The voice of Cecilia’s husband Tom is heard next as he receives the news about the plane crash. How did she survive she wonders and why was she granted life? As we next meet the fourth voice of a young girl whose father died in the crash and who was the pilot. But, things spiral out of control for all four as Cecilia finds herself wondering how she is going to cope with motherhood, what choices did she have in the past as Freya is bombarded by reporters intimating that something about her father was not right.

A reporter would change Freya’s perspective planting a seed of doubt about her father and how he handled the flight. Did he crash on purpose? Why didn’t he follow proper procedure? But, lives intersect and Richard, her brother finds himself out in the cold and meets Cecilia coming from the hospital after talking to a survivor. Wondering why this young man chose to talk to her and how she could comfort him when she really did not even want to be a mother, creates a conflict within herself as she falls prey to her own guilt. Tom, with his friend Jim, has to question him about his daughter and as the events of the night come about question marks about Libby’s death punctuate the cold air within Jim’s home while questioning him and his son.

Tom has his own crosses to bear as truths about him are hidden and finding evidence that his wife would have remained hidden sets the stage for more deceit, lies and betrayals. But, what is he guilty of? Who is Maddie? Marrying out of convenience and regretting it from day one was a decision both Tom and Cecilia made? Who would suffer in the end?
Flashbacks that Freya reveals of an incident when she was ten explains what might have happened in the present and why someone would think her father might have taken his life and that of others. Lies and betrayals are all around as Ethan seems to be hiding something regarding his sister’s state of mind, while Tom feels guilt about Maddie and both Jim and Cecilia have their own secrets. Four voices each dealing with the crash in their own separate ways as Freya comes full circle with her thoughts.

Cecilia befriends a young man named Richard who happens to be Freya’s brother whose dealing with his own demons as she once again visits an older woman in the hospital who survived the crash. The threads come together as Cecilia finally realizes where she does not belong, Freya learns a harsh reality about her family, Jim’s life is endangered and Tom fits the pieces together as the investigation comes to a close: Jim, Cecilia, Tom, Freya: Whose voices will be heard and whose might be silenced when the truth’s, lies, betrayals, deceits and fears come out when one young girl faces the realities of her father’s actions, a mother who is in denial, one young woman grieving over her mistakes or a man caught in the middle. . A powerful story of four people coming of age you might say as all four come to face within a short span of time, their innermost thoughts, their fears, desires, reconcile with their pasts and try and shed the guilt, in order to survive: AFTER WE FALL!