No matter how painful something is, you have to take it. I saw that in both my parents.
If there's anything I'd hate as a son-in-law, it's an actor; and if there's anything I think I'd hate worse than an actor as a son-in-law, it's an English actor.
Good fiction creates empathy. A novel takes you somewhere and asks you to look through the eyes of another person, to live another life.