Things I Need You to Know

You don’t know what you’ve got till it’s gone.

Birdie McBride seems to have it all: a fulfilling and lucrative job, five healthy daughters and a doting husband, Ned, at home keeping the family machine running smoothly.

But then Ned dies. He leaves behind a document for Birdie—‘Things I Need You to Know’—full of guidance on everything from household maintenance to the intimate details of each daughter’s emotional landscape. Composed in his dying days, it’s his last act of fatherly devotion. Reading Ned’s manual, Birdie falls for her husband in a way she never did when he was alive. Yet the presence of his best friend, Marcello, complicates things. As well as having been Ned’s doctor, Marcello is Birdie’s ex-lover—though not as ‘ex’ as most people would think. And his feelings for Birdie are as strong as ever.

When more calamities rock her family, Birdie starts to wonder: how much trust can you put in feelings? And in old friends? Can the legacy of ‘Things I Need You to Know’ save her family from the catastrophic end barrelling towards them?

‘A biting, uproarious portrait of domesticity in disarray, intractable grief, love and betrayal, motherhood, and the long shadow cast by family legacies. Every character in Mark Lamprell's latest novel is sharply realised...Things I Need You to Know dramatically switches gears in the final chapters, taking the reader somewhere far darker and pleasingly unexpected. It will appeal to readers of Toni Jordan, Sally Hepworth and Tracy Farr.’ - Books+Publishing