A review by artemisg
The Two Lives of Lydia Bird by Josie Silver

emotional hopeful slow-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? Character
  • Strong character development? Yes
  • Loveable characters? It's complicated
  • Diverse cast of characters? No
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

3.5

 This book was good, but not as good as I anticipated. Maybe that’s because the story centres around a woman overcoming the grief of losing the love of her life in a fatal car accident, and my experiences with grief are not comparable to that. 
 
That being said, Silver does a truly wonderful job of portraying grief, and it did make me tear up a couple of times. That was the highlight of this novel for me, the grief that Lydia felt was so heart-wrenching, and some of the prose in this novel was achingly beautiful. Other things I really liked about this book include the premise, Lydia entered a new world where Freddie (the dead fiancé) was alive, and she could live their life together. This was a wonderful premise and I genuinely think Silver did a great job of writing it, and writing it just off enough that Lydia felt the changes and turbulence, making her really think about the choices she was making. 
 
Now, onto things I enjoyed less. This book was slow, but that was manageable, because it was so easy to read and well written. However, once we finally got to the end, I started to despise Lydia. She had wildly unrealistic expectations for her sister and mum (arguably the best characters in the novel) and simply refused to see how she was making their lives difficult, just like, not acknowledging that life can be hard for everyone. Also, genuinely really disliked the ending. I get that this is ultimately a romance, so it makes sense, but I wish the ending was different,
I wish that platonic love was depicted as equally as important as romantic, and that Lydia’s discomfort at the confession in her dream realm was reflected in reality, or that the confession itself didn’t happen.
 
Overall, this is a good book, it’s well written, full of both heart and humour (Ryan my beloved). It was ultimately a quietly empowering story of a woman working through her grief (even if she was a bit of a shithead sometimes). 
Expand filter menu Content Warnings