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

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I love Dawn French! I think she is such a funny woman!! I was so happy to have won a copy of her fiction book entitled Oh Dear Silvia from Goodreads. However, once I started reading the book, it became apparent that I wasn't going to enjoy it. Reading this has increased the respect I hold for Dawn French. I never read her first book but was interested in story of her second. As the title reveals, the story circles around Silvia, who is lying unconscious in a hospital intensive care unit. We meet her ex-husband, her estranged daughter, her best friend, her cleaner and her nurse, who all talk to the sleeping Silvia, revealing what has happened in the past. All, except the kindly nurse, have their axes to grind with the unconscious patient, who by all accounts isn't a very nice person. Or is she just misunderstood?

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. 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.

Christmas Gifts

This book follows Silvia Shute, who is currently in a coma in hospital after falling three floors from her balcony. Although she doesn't speak throughout the book, it shows six characters who visit her hospital room and have differing relationships with her, each very different from the others. The book is written from six perspectives; ex-husband Ed, sister Jo, nurse Winnie, housekeeper Tia, friend Cat and daughter Cassie. I had no problems with the book being told from so many different points of view, in fact it was more interesting that way, however, each one of the characters seemed to either a) hate Silvia; or b) be completely ambivalent about her so I started to wonder why they were even there. I also had issues with each character individually which I will now get into, I wished for a little less use of dialect in the nurse looking after Silvia, though I have to admit the housekeepers malapropisms (due to her sons teaching her the wrong words in English) were hilarious. A little dialect goes a long way, and in some parts it's too heavy for reading pleasure. The internationally bestselling author and acclaimed comedic actress Dawn French makes her American literary debut with this riveting novel of secrets, forgiveness, guilt, and love.

To explain my rating of this book, although there was a lot of elements of this book which I enjoyed, it did take me a while to get into it. At first I was very unsure about the book. There were parts that held my attention and some parts I struggled with. At the beginning, I didn't enjoy the writing, particularly the way most of the words were underlined for emphasis. I got used to it, then different dialects were brought in which, again, made me unsure. I did find Winnie's Jamaican dialect to be charming, though I was unsure about Tia. Tia is foreign and her children taught her to use lots of swearing and incorrect words when talking - sure, it was funny at the start, but I found it to be tiresome after a while and didn't like it. Our most serious character in the book is probably Ed, who I did enjoy reading about, but sometimes, in contrast with the other characters, felt a little dull. As I am meant to, I started the book feeling certain ways about several characters and slowly and with revelations suddenly found victims and their controllers were switching places, reasons for behaviours were shed light on, misconceptions were cleared. But only for the reader. Also, if a coked-up doctor who you suspect is abusive enough a person that you need to isolate your whole family from her, including your unborn grandchild, turns up at your house high as a kite with a dead husband in her trunk, you call the police. Silvia’s motivation to begin a relationship with Cat and cut herself off from her whole family feels really unrealistic and I didn’t buy it at all. None of the aspects of Silvia gel and, for this novel to be successful, this needed to happen.Dawn French has been making people laugh for thirty years. On purpose. As a writer, comedian and actor, she has appeared in some of this country's most long running, cherished and celebrated shows, including French and Saunders, The Comic Strip Presents. . ., Murder Most Horrid, The Vicar of Dibley, Jam and Jerusalem, Lark Rise to Candleford, and more recently, Roger and Val Have Just Got In. The Silvia of the title is a lady in a coma in hospital and although she is the central character of the story we don't really actually hear from her and, instead, it's the cast of characters who come to visit her who create the character of Silvia for us. Each chapter is about an individual character, often running as their own monologue of their thoughts about Silvia or the things they have to say to her. These characters range from Silvia's family members, her friend, her cleaner to her nurse, Winnie, who really felt like the lynch-pin for the whole story. Each character comes along to visit Silvia, for various different reasons, and through the things they have to say we learn about them as well as about Silvia. Now she's unconscious in a hospital bed, at the mercy of the mad friends and crazy relatives who have come to visit. Her beleaguered ex-husband, her newly independent daughter, her West Indian nurse, her bohemian sister, her best friend, her enthusiastic housekeeper, and others all share a piece of their collective mind with the complex woman—the bad mother, the cherished sister, the selfish wife, the matchless lover, the egotist, the martyr—they think they know.

Really enjoyable and highly recommended. Dawn French is a wonderful writer - witty, wise and poignant Daily Mail (London) Un vantaggio però c'è, nella solitudine, e cioè che attraverso di lei tutto acquista un fascino particolare. Hai così disperatamente bisogno di vedere un po' di bellezza per mitigare tutto lo schifo che hai attorno, che gli alberi finiscono per essere più verdi, il sole più caldo e il pane più buono di quanto non lo fosse quando pensavi di essere felice, e per niente solo. È come se il mondo m'invitasse a uscire a giocare - e indossa il suo vestito migliore." After having read "A tiny bit marvellous" - Dawn French's debut fictional novel - I had high hopes for Oh Dear Silvia, but I was also slightly apprehensive. There was something magical (in realistic terms) about "A Tiny Bit Marvellous" and I feared she wouldn't be able to live up to this. And indeed, this novel is very different from "A tiny bit marvellous"; so much so that you feel slightly confused in the beginning. Is it a comedy? Can you even laugh about this subject (yes, you can, to a certain extent)? Is it a drama? Or a thriller? But I should have known I could relax: Dawn French is an excellent writer, and you're safe in her hands.I started this book with little expectation regarding the execution but with high hopes. I knew that the novel was supposed to be quite morbid but I imagined that with Dawn French behind the keyboard, there was sure to be level of humour, and in this I suppose I wasn't wrong. Also, this was meant to be funny???? There is literally nothing in it that I even thought was meant to be a joke. She is frank about the challenges at the other end of this line, too, with her own daughter, now 21 and testing her wings. "She's at college, in the same county as me – far enough away to be in her own digs, but home every weekend, with a big pile of laundry, ready for Sunday lunch and a good row!" Another huge belly laugh. "You're very connected, but you mustn't control too much, you mustn't interfere too much. It's time for me to take my hands off the reins, but how do you know when to do that? You just kind of feel your way through it, and you war a little bit, all the way through … I have a theory that the reason you have the wars is so that the eventual tearing is not too unbearable. You'd die of sorrow, if you didn't already have a bit where you'd gone, 'oh go on then! Go on and make your own way!'" And again she laughs.

Instead what I got was the tale of a complex woman, one misunderstood by almost everyone in her life, told through the visitors to her hospital room, where she lies in a coma. French masterfully takes us through Sylvia's life. We change our view of her and the people around her as the book progresses, and by the end, we wish all could have been explained, made right. Oh Dear Silvia is the second novel by British comedienne/actress, and now author, Dawn French. I had seen glowing praise for her debut novel, A Tiny Bit Marvellous, so I was delighted to receive this book for review to decide for myself whether Dawn is as good an author as she is a comedienne. Oh Dear Silvia is the brand new novel from one of Britain's most loved comic writers and the number one bestselling author of A Tiny Bit Marvellous.Which made the ending more poignant. One character WILL get their comeuppance. Another's selfless actions will possibly never be understood, but if so, never can be made right. 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.