The snags, sorrows, secrets and estrangements of familial connections are ripe themes explored in the fiction of British author Katy Regan. In How to Find Your Way Home, she astutely...plumbs the depths of one family torn apart by a simple moment in time that upends lives and fates ... Deeply moving ... Tender-hearted ... Regan is a meticulous, graceful writer whose insight on the human condition makes for a completely absorbing story ... She presents a full, well-balanced picture ... Absorbing.
Moving if heavy-handed ... The bird migration metaphors are overly abundant, but the relationship between Emily and Stephen feels solid and true. While this doesn’t quite soar from its formulaic trappings, it has plenty of moments of uplift.
The story is centered around the friendship and love between the siblings as they reconnect and the love of bird-watching that has been Stephen’s savior for the decades he’s been unmoored from what is typically considered a normal life. However, after a lengthy windup to the climax of the story—just what happened on that day so long ago? And what does it mean for the future of these siblings?—the ending somehow feels both rushed and drawn out, with unsatisfying gaps. An incomplete redemption arc mars an otherwise strong story about how even well-intentioned lies can destroy lives.
