Oh Dear Silvia: The gloriously heartwarming novel from the No. 1 bestselling author of Because of You

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I love the idea behind this book - The whole book takes place in Coma Suite 5, where Silvia, a friend, lover and mother lies in a coma. The story is told through several people - her ex-husband (Ed), her sister (Jo), her daughter (Cassie), her 'lover' (Cat), her housekeeper (Tia) and her nurse (Winnie). There isn't really a progressive plot as such, but this is more of a collection of memories, wishes and thoughts have about Silvia and how she has changed each narrator's life. I find books like this very intriguing, so I was interested in seeing what each person had to say. The title of this book really works. After reading the book, I would say it definitely fits well with the story. As she has got older, she says, she has felt less and less the need to perform, to put on a "firework display. And it's a massive relief. Somewhere in my 40s I thought, 'this is exhausting, trying to make it alright for everybody and trying to please everyone all the time.' It doesn't mean you have to turn in and be entirely selfish – it just means you have to stop a little bit of that." Did people find it disconcerting? "I think some people did, yeah. Because I just went a bit quieter. I think you only find out your true nature when you return home, and when you have a bit of peace and quiet. The characters are well-developed which I found to be a relief. Each chapter of the book is told by someone who knows Silvia. The main characters that have their own chapters being Ed, Cat, Jo, Cassie, Winnie, and Tia. Ed is by far the most boring character that could ever be in a book. All he mostly talks about is his boring trees. Whilst I did find him to be a well-developed character, I found him extremely dull and found myself wishing that he'd just stop talking. Winnie and Tia were my favourite characters. Winnie has a big heart, and it really comes across in this book. Tia is from Indonesia so has a hard time pronouncing Silvia's surname which always made me laugh!! I found Tia and Jo to be the characters that brought the humour, and they delivered! Cat is the high strung character, and Cassie is the angry daughter. Each character has a unique personality. Well done to Dawn French for making each character unique! Through each of the characters' stories, we learn more and more about Silvia.

The housekeeper Tia almost seemed like an irrelevant character only brought in to show cultural diversity and an extra point of view. I did think that Tia was very stereotypical; she is an Asian housekeeper stealing from her employer to make some more money who calls Silvia 'Mrs Shit' and apparently doesn't want to understand why her sons laugh at her when they teach her new words (which are actually expletives). I couldn't fully understand why Tia was there as a character because she had no real emotional connection with her employer and therefore it seemed odd that she would be visiting her in hospital. She describes, for instance, the moment of shift from daughter to matriarch, as it becomes clear, in the novel, that Silvia will not waken. It was something she felt herself, as it became obvious that her own mother would not survive. "I just felt, 'Oh, god. Because my dad had already died" – he killed himself when she was 19 – "I thought, 'Oh, god, I'm going to have to grow up.'" A huge belly laugh. "I'm going to be that person in the family, I'm going to be the matriarch." When Dawn French wrote her first novel [[A Tiny Bit Marvellous by Dawn French]] I was eager to read it, looking forward to plenty of silly humour and those elusive-when-reading out loud laughs. I was disappointed unfortunately, and actually came away from the book feeling annoyed with the characters and quite discouraged and depressed somehow. So, I approached her new novel with a little trepidation, unsure as to whether she deserved a second chance. I'm glad I gave her the benefit of the doubt!I really wanted to like this book and in fact I had mentioned it enough times that my boyfriend bought this for my 21st birthday (3 years ago, oh my goodness). I really just couldn't get into this book and I had some major issues with it. She and Henry have both described their parting as involving a year of concerted effort to be kind, and to end up "as chums, as we had started, if you like". Perhaps this is true, and very impressive if so; perhaps there is a good helping of wish fulfilment, or a united front for the media. Whatever the case, both are now seeing other people, Henry a theatre producer, and French a charity worker who used to work with her mother, and who also had, somewhat to her surprise (given how much of a mainstay she has been in the BBC light entertainment schedules for the last 30 years), never seen her on screen. Before I start critically reviewing this book, I wanted to first express my love for Dawn French. I think she is a fantastic person with a wonderful personality and brilliant comedic timing. I have previously read her autobiography, Dear Fatty as well as her first fictional novel, A Tiny Bit Marvellous, both of which I loved and gave 5 stars without question. This book was pitched as 'if you liked the previous books, you'll love Oh Dear Silvia'. Unfortunately this wasn't the case for me.

Her past holds a dark and terrible secret, and now that she is unconscious in a hospital bed, her constant stream of visitors are set to uncover the mystery of her broken life. And she must lie there, victim of the beloveds, the borings, the babblings and the plain bonkers. Starting with the character of Ed, Silvia's ex-husband, I struggled to understand why he was in her hospital room when according to him, she had completely beaten down his self-esteem to the point where there marriage ended and he no longer wanted to be around her. I couldn't understand the rationale for wanting to be there for somebody who supposedly broke you. Ed doesn't like sister Jo either and that just makes the whole bed-watching a chore and very painful. It also makes no sense that he was forced to sleep on his mother's couch when he owns his own successful wood where he spends most of his days. Will Silvia, who’s in a coma in the hospital, ever speak again? If not, then her visitors, friends and family will help piece together her story, while also revealing their own. Also, this was meant to be funny???? There is literally nothing in it that I even thought was meant to be a joke. These days she spends most of her time at her house in Cornwall, writing (she has two more novels expected by Penguin). After decades of collaborative work she says she relishes the independence. "There is something about making every decision, every decision – commas, full stops – everything … that is … delightful. I've lived in a world of compromise. Most of which has been excellently good, and a good lesson for me. But there is something, when you want to shoot off a certain way, and no one is saying, 'Don't!' … So here I go!"As she lies there, captive to the beloveds, the babblers, and the stark-raving bonkers who alternate at her bedside, the dark and terrible secret she has been hiding for years begins to emerge. I loved it. Having just finished, and thinking about the book as a whole, it is very assured and from one you might think is an experienced writer.