Books like My real children by Jo Walton

In 2015, Patricia Cowan, now old and confused, confronts a maze of memories that seem impossible. She cannot recall whether she married Mark and had four children, or raised three children with Bee. She remembers a 1963 event that killed President Kennedy and a 1964 nuclear exchange that destroyed Miami and Kiev, yet she also recalls Kennedy choosing not to run again. Her past includes solid memories of her childhood and Oxford years during the Second World War, but the line between what happened and what might have happened blurs. Patricia’s internal struggle raises questions about identity, memory in old age, and the uncertain nature of historical events. The novel explores intimacy, uncertainty, and the blurred boundaries between personal history and collective memory, set against a backdrop of alternative history and nuclear conflict.

First publish date: 2001