Sometimes I love a book while I’m reading it but two weeks later I have largely forgotten it. In other cases, I not only remember details but find myself reflecting on them day after day. Sunset by Jessie Cave falls into the latter category: a highly enjoyable but also profound novel.

I really want to share this recommendation with everyone, but it’s going to be tough to talk about Sunset without spoilers. Even my one-sentence review on Instagram arguably included a spoiler! So I’m going to do a brief spoiler-free review, then a very clear spoiling warning before delving into the key subject matter. (The plot summary on Storygraph does an admirable job of getting the essence of the book while remaining spoiler-free.)

This is the story of sisters Ruth and Hannah, narrated by younger sibling Ruth. They’re very different people but have maintained a close relationship into their late 20s. Hannah is grounded, always in a serious long-term relationship, has a career and runs a charity on the side that gives books to children who can’t otherwise afford them. Ruth’s life is…messier. She has been floundering since art school, working zero-hours contracts, mostly at fast-food outlets. She sleeps on a mattress on the floor and survives largely on caffeine and sugar.

Every year, Hannah arranges a cheap holiday for the two of them. She books everything, tells Ruth what to pack and when to be ready, and off they go. This year, she’s about to turn 30 and Ruth can tell from the first hours of the holiday that things are different. But the event she fears is not the one that turns everything upside-down.

After the something happens, Ruth isolates herself. She becomes the cliché of the city dweller who is surrounded by millions but connects with no-one. She tries to be cold and indifferent, but she isn’t really either of those things.

Ruth is a very likeable narrator, despite her inability to take care of herself properly and questionable decisions. In fact, she owns those decisions. The first chapter ends with a “List of weird things I’ve done in the last eight months” that includes such gems as “Severely burnt my tongue on microwaved lasagne and got so angry that I threw it out the window. It landed on top of a bus stop and was eaten by pigeons for days and days” and “Incorrectly completed multiple Sudoku puzzles in newspapers and wrote slightly aggressive and cryptic things like I STILL KNOW WHAT YOU DID LAST SUMMER next to them”. She’s funny, self-effacing and very sympathetic.

It gradually becomes clear there is a reason why Ruth is this much of a mess. Cave doesn’t reveal what happened right away, teasing it out for a few chapters. But the bulk of the novel comes after, making the main subject the psychological effect of what has happened.

*** Spoilers ahead ***

Cave is, I now realise, more famous as an actor and stand-up comic, with a large following on Instagram and no doubt many fans elsewhere too. So it’s possible a lot of people will come to this novel knowing a little about her personal life and therefore able to guess what happens on that fateful holiday. Because something similar happened to Cave’s brother in 2019.

In a tragic, stupid accident, Hannah dies. So this is a book about grief for a beloved sibling, informed by grief for a beloved sibling. I don’t mean to say it’s semi-autobiographical, more that it has an emotional authenticity. It feels raw and real.

Ruth falls apart, but not completely. She does stupid things (mostly, though not all, sex-related) and she deals sensibly with stuff that must be dealt with. She’s indifferent then angry, hollowed out then overwhelmed.

I found this description of grief so completely relatable. People are complicated and weird and everyone’s grief is uniquely weird. Cave finds humour in Ruth’s impatience with trite platitudes and in her acerbic observations of the people she’s trying to keep a distance from. The humour never undermines the underlying awfulness of her loss.

*** End spoilers ***

It’s possible this book has stayed with me due to the coincidence that I have a sister called Ruth. We’re close in age and quite different in temperament but get along very well. But our lives are very far from the sisters of the novel so I think it’s mostly that this is a very well written book.

Published 2021 by Welbeck Fiction.

Source: present from a friend.