Days Of Awe by Lauren Fox- 256 pages

Book Blurb:

Only a year ago Isabel Moore was married, the object of adoration of her ten-year-old daughter, and thought she knew everything about her wild, extravagant, beloved best friend, Josie. But in that one short year: her husband moved out and rented his own apartment; her daughter grew into a moody insomniac; and Josie — impulsive, funny, secretive Josie — was killed behind the wheel in a single-car accident. As Isabel tries to make sense of this shattering loss and unravel the months leading up to Josie’s death, she comes to understand the shifts, large and small, that can upend a friendship and an entire life.

My Review: 5 stars

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Days Of Awe is a book that has left an indelible imprint on my heart. I was at an event that I was co-hosting for book clubs and the Random House rep, bless her heart, handed me a copy of Days Of Awe. She said it was her pick for best book sheโ€™d read this year. Sold. Done. Thrilled to own a copy. But she followed up by telling me itโ€™s about a woman in her mid 40s whose best friend suddenly dies.

Wait, what? Now itโ€™s kryptonite. No. Too close to home.

At 42 years old, I lost my best friend and I couldnโ€™t imagine reading about someone elseโ€™s pain and loss. I had just survived my own!ย But after seeing the glowing reviews, I felt healed (perhaps) and strong enough to dig in. After all, this is fiction and NOT MY STORY!

We know the heart of the book is the death of the protagonistโ€™s best friend, and she has many incredibly accurate and heart wrenching quotes about that very subject. But this book is so much more. Mothering, being mothered, love, marriage, the hierarchy of grief, mean girls, starting over and religion all blend together for a wonderful story of one womanโ€™s coming to terms with her new โ€œnormalโ€.

Aside from that, it was the writing in this book that is so on top of the game. Her way with words, the descriptive nature and perfect use of metaphors will keep you wanting more. Well done!

Quotes I liked:

Thatโ€™s what my brain felt like on the day of my best friendโ€™s funeral and for many weeks after: a confounding map of twisted, barely navigable roads that were long and tangled and led nowhere or doubled back without warning and ended up where they had began.โ€

-โ€œYou canโ€™t preserve anything: every happy moment is already on its way to becoming nostalgia. Thatโ€™s the problem.โ€

-โ€œAnd maybe the world cracks open in those moments and a little bit of light comes in, and just for a few seconds I can not only imagine being happy in a world without Josie, but Iโ€™m actually living in that world. And then the crack seals up and Iโ€™m back on familiar ground, and I remember to miss my friend, and I am relieved.

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