Don't Ask Me Why

by Tania Kindersley

Ashley's parents are too busy fighting, drinking and having affairs to have any time for her. When she meets the beautiful, funny Virge she knows she's found her new family. Virge and her elder brother also go to Oxford. But when they leave the University, everything seems to go wrong.

Genres: Fiction, Chick Lit, Young Adult

320 pages, Paperback

First published March 6, 1997

About the author

I live in Scotland where I write books and look after two antic lurchers and two gentle thoroughbred mares.

Reviews

[katie · Rating 5 out of 5]

After Goodbye Johnny Thunders i read this and this is all about boho london and a bored middle class girl that breaks out and meets a bunch of friends that change her life and their adventures through their early 20's that make them the people they are... another books ive read about 5 times. i think ive even ear marked pages and paragraphs that make my tummy turn upside down.

[Rose McClelland · Rating 5 out of 5]

One of my favourite books of all time! I remember reading this after uni and being blown away by it. Beautifully written, I loved the nostalgic hindsight and the constant hints that drama was about to unfold. This is the book that made me want to write.

[Gary Twynam · Rating 4 out of 5]

I came to Tania via twitter. I was looking for like minded people and she loves the horses - my how she loves the horses. This led me to her blog which I believe to be a work of wonder, easily the best of its kind - a mildly eccentric sideways look at life from the margins as she tries to catch things she glimpses out of the corner of her eye, things she can sometimes hold but can never tame. Like a poet.

So I looked up her back catalogue. All out of print, bar the Sarah Vine thing and that's not for me. Then one day I stumbled drunkenly upon this paperback on a dusty cottage shelf, liberated it and read it one sitting.

It's a self-indulgent book about very privileged and clever people taking their entire twenties to come of age. And presumably it's at least partly autobiographical given the Oxford University setting. It's beautifully written. And decidedly not chick lit. (There's nothing wrong with chick lit, but I suspect more than a few books deserving of a wider audience have been lost within its marketing.)

In the book the narrator cites The Big Chill as one of her favourite films. Well, that's me sold, for it is definitely mine. And there's a scene in the film where the dull husband of one of the main characters acts as a choric critic of the friends at the heart of the film. He points them up as self-obsessed and empty.

Tania replays the same scene here, whereby a chippy outsider pours scorn on the vacuous, self regarding, posturing of her little gang. The book has a self-loathing at its heart that is deeply compelling and strangely touching. As per her blog.

This book really should be in print and aimed at a wider audience.

[Matt JL · Rating 5 out of 5]

Wonderfully devastating

[sophie · Rating 4 out of 5]

Beautiful

[georgia L · Rating 3 out of 5]

great writer, nostalgic and of the moment

[Amber Davies · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is the best book I’ve read this year. From teenagers to adults, to pain to life and loving and leaving and heartbreak. This girl just rights everything I didn’t know I needed to read.

[Jan · Rating 3 out of 5]

It didn't quite live up to expectations for me - I guess because I didn't really identify with any of the characters. However, the story was enjoyable.