Ungrateful

'A vivid depiction of how easy it is to get trapped by other people's expectations. Full of heartbreak but also hope, I really rooted for the women in this novel.' Louise Hare

Can you ever escape your past?

Cat knows she should be more grateful for her partner James. As a young woman struggling to care for her alcoholic mother, he whisked her away from the violence and addiction of her council estate home and offered her a taste of middle-class comfort.

But twenty years later, the escape he offered has begun to feel stifling. Surrounded by immaculate white carpets and scented candles, everything has its place in James's house, except it seems, Cat. She had a place to study at university after finishing school, but her mother was too unwell for Cat to take it. She begins to dream of the opportunities education could offer her.

At a university open day, Cat finds herself standing before teenage boyfriend, Daniel, now a lecturer. As the spark that drew them together returns, Cat hopes that he can in some way help her reconnect with the drive and optimism of her younger self. Or perhaps she is simply hurtling back towards a past that can only hurt her further...

Can Cat let go of her demons to become the person she always hoped to be, or is it too late?

What readers are saying about Ungrateful:

'A total pleasure.' Eva Verde

'Touched me deeply.' Juno Roche

'Compulsively readable with huge heart.' Alex Allison

'Clever, gripping, heartbreaking but also ultimately hopeful. I want to read this book again and again and again.' Cat White

'I loved it. As soon as I started reading, I was in. Ungrateful expertly explores the physical, emotional and intellectual repercussions of being born into poverty.' Lynne Voyce

'Kept me on the edge of my seat, courageously challenging mainstream conceptions of class with an empowering message for positive change. Gets hold of the working-class stereotype and smashes it to bits.' Shaun Wilson

'I inhaled this book!... Just want to read it all over again.' Eve Ainsworth

'A soul-questioning novel that helps us understand the currency of gratitude in our deeply imbalanced and transactional world in which to change one's life is to be indebted to someone else's.' Kit Fan

I devoured Ungrateful in one sitting and immediately wanted to read it again. Angela Chadwick breathes life into a complex and overlooked heroine who you will root for with every inch of you. It is clever, gripping, heartbreaking but also ultimately hopeful. I want to read this book again and again and again.' -- Cat White
I loved it. As soon as I started reading, I was in. Ungrateful expertly explores the physical, emotional and intellectual repercussions of being born into poverty. Yet, with such strong characters, it is very a hopeful read. -- Lynne Voyce
Kept me on the edge of my seat, courageously challenging mainstream conceptions of class with an empowering message for positive change. Gets hold of the working-class stereotype and smashes it to bits. -- Shaun Wilson
A vivid depiction of how easy it is to get trapped by other people's expectations. Full of heartbreak but also hope, I really rooted for the women in this novel. -- Louise Hare
I inhaled this book! A powerful, realistic working class novel that asks if you can ever really escape from your past. I adored Cat and Bernice, recognised so much of my own life and just want to read it all over again. -- Eve Ainsworth
Very few heroines in contemporary fiction are as aspirational and resourceful yet torn and burdened as Catherine Brandon in Angela Chadwick's Ungrateful. With quiet clarity, Chadwick brings the undercurrents of class, race, debt and addiction to the surface, creating a vivid and fragile web of human interactions haunted by the price of self-reinvention and independence. It is a soul-questioning novel that helps us understand the currency of gratitude in our deeply imbalanced and transactional world in which to change one's life is to be indebted to someone else's. -- Kit Fan
Absolutely loved Ungrateful by Angela Chadwick. I resonated with the themes in all the ways - returning to education was the best thing I ever did for myself. Tried resisting until I'd finished book 2 but I am terribly easily led & this was a total pleasure.
Such a great read - so much of it touched me deeply and my own experience of starting again and struggling to feel worthy. Thank you Angela Chadwick for a beautiful read in a sunny corner -- Juno Roche
An elegy to unrealised potential, Ungrateful is a masterful exploration of class identity. Angela Chadwick navigates that liminal, cramped space between the roadblocks imposed upon us, and the ones we erect for ourselves. Compulsively readable with huge heart. -- Alex Allison

Angela Chadwick is a former journalist who works in higher education communications. Her debut novel XX was published by Dialogue Books in October 2018 and was named a Guardian book of the year. In 2019 it won the Polari First Book Prize.

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