I Wish I Could Say I Was Sorry... by Susie Kelly

With uncompromising honesty and hints of her usual humour, the author describes emigrating, from post-war London in every shade of grey to the technicolour splendour of Kenya, as part of a dysfunctional family. From profound lows to sublime highs, the one constant is her pony, Cinderella. You may shed a tear at her losses, and you will almost certainly be shocked and appalled by what she does for the love of Cinderella.
If you have enjoyed reading of Susie's life and travels in France, then this book will give you a moving insight into her earlier life, and allow you to judge her actions for yourself

Blackbirdebooks offered me to read Susie Kelly's latest book I Wish I Could Say I Was Sorry... and once again she blew me away. The writing is fabulous as always, but the genre is very different than her previous books.

Her travelogues and her tales of running a two holiday cottages are vastly different from this, her memoirs. While there's still a glimmer of her usual humour, her story is in fact quite bleak, and she had me moved to tears. Without spoiling much I can say that I have a very warm relationship with my parents and after finishing her book I wanted to hug them both very closely - and then I wanted to hug Kelly for having to go through all that.

Kelly is born in the UK but also lives for a long time in Kenya - a country which I've visited and loved and it was splendid reading about it. Everything she writes is so informative, you can't help but learn something about the given place she's writing about whether you've been there yourself or not.

Once again she's written a book I can only recommend. It's an easy read you can't help but fly through as it's hard to put it down once you've started.

I Wish I Could Say I Was Sorry... ASIN: B00CS8YG34 298 pages / published in 2013

Review by Iben Jakobsen, BoB, 2013

*Updated with new cover*