STELLA Sweeney, beautician-turned-self help author, has returned to Dublin after living the high life in New York.

She has a bad case of writer's block and dented self-esteem.

Matters are not exactly helped by her yoga-mad son who insists on cooking up culinary experiments (hot dog with pineapple hotpot anyone?) or her ex-husband's attempts to hit the big time as an artist by selling off his worldly goods in the ludicrous Karma project.

But as ever with Marian Keyes, there is a darker undertone to the flippancy.

It soon emerges that her only bestseller, One Blink At A Time was inspired by her recovery from Guillain-Barre syndrome, a rare condition, which left her unable to move anything apart from her eyelids.

How did she ever make it through such an ordeal, and why exactly has her glittering new career turned to dust?

The need to know the answers to all this and more will keep you turning the pages.

7/10
Review by Anita Chaudhuri