☆☆➹⁀☆ 4 stars ☆➹⁀☆☆
About the Book:
Written with Josie Silver’s trademark warmth and wit, The Two Lives of Lydia Bird is a powerful and thrilling love story about the what-ifs that arise at life’s crossroads, and what happens when one woman is given a miraculous chance to answer them.
Lydia and Freddie. Freddie and Lydia. They’d been together for more than a decade and Lydia thought their love was indestructible. But she was wrong. On Lydia’s twenty-eighth birthday, Freddie died in a car accident.
So now it’s just Lydia, and all she wants is to hide indoors and sob until her eyes fall out. But Lydia knows that Freddie would want her to try to live fully, happily, even without him. So, enlisting the help of his best friend, Jonah, and her sister, Elle, she takes her first tentative steps into the world, open to life—and perhaps even love—again.
But then something inexplicable happens that gives her another chance at her old life with Freddie. A life where none of the tragic events of the past few months have happened.
Lydia is pulled again and again through the doorway to her past, living two lives, impossibly, at once. But there’s an emotional toll to returning to a world where Freddie, alive, still owns her heart. Because there’s someone in her new life, her real life, who wants her to stay.
My Thoughts:
Author Josie Silver has referenced Sliding Doors as an inspiration in interviews. After studying the idea of multiverse, she gave her main character, Lydia Bird, an opportunity to see her relationship with her soul mate continue. But at what cost? Things are similar but not the same in Lydia’s two worlds/lives.
I loved the tight-knit Bird family. Lydia, her sister, Eleanor, and their mother are just lovely. Lydia’s description of her perfect partner, Freddie, make him seem like the romantic boyfriend that every one wishes for, but after a while, I found him to be less than perfect. His boyishness eventually feels self-centered and irresponsible. Jonah Jones is a lifelong friend to both Freddy and Lydia. He is at times the gangly third-wheel, the rival for Freddy’s attention, and potentially the unrequited admirer of Lydia Bird. The cast of secondary characters, which consist primarily of co-workers, add extra charm and appeal to the story.
In interviews, the author leaves it to the reader to determine for themselves whether Lydia actually experienced a dual life (multiverse theory) or if her experiences were drug-induced dreams where she worked through her loss. Whatever your interpretation, the story is delightful. There are scenes that broke my heart. There are scenes that stole my heart. While the plausibility of the story was difficult at times, there are so many lovely parts that make it a beautiful tale of family, friendship, and love.
The audiobook is excellently narrated by Olivia Vinall.
About the Author: Josie Silver is an unashamed romantic who met her husband when she stepped on his foot on his twenty-first birthday. She lives with him, her two young sons, and their cats in a little midlands town in England.
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