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The Young Widow's Book of Home Improvement
Virginia Lloyd was single at 32, married at 32, and widowed at 34.
A young professional woman finally meets the man she wants to spend the rest of her life with, only to discover that he is terminally ill. After her beloved John's death from cancer, Virginia was faced with addressing the chronic rising damp problem in the house they had shared and, over her first year as a young widow, her house had to dry from the inside out – and so did Virginia. The Young Widow's Book of Home Improvement is a wry and touching love story that plays with the parallels between our homes and ourselves.
A young professional woman finally meets the man she wants to spend the rest of her life with, only to discover that he is terminally ill. After her beloved John's death from cancer, Virginia was faced with addressing the chronic rising damp problem in the house they had shared and, over her first year as a young widow, her house had to dry from the inside out – and so did Virginia. The Young Widow's Book of Home Improvement is a wry and touching love story that plays with the parallels between our homes and ourselves.
266 pages, Hardcover
First published April 7, 2008
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 32 reviews
July 1, 2013
The only reason I didn't originally give this memoir five stars is because I wanted more. A year later, the book still lives vividly in my mind and I know that's the work of a talented author, so I've re-rated it.
The Young Widow's Guide to Home Improvement is both a love story and a memoir of loss. There are no surprises: it's all laid out in the title. The author Virginia Lloyd falls in love and discovers too soon that the illness which her beloved is being treated for is terminal. The memoir alternates between "after" - young widowhood - and "before" - courtship and newly wed. The pivotal moment is the death of John, Virginia's husband, way too soon at the age of 47.
But death isn't the book's theme. The book sings of love and grief, with a persistent chorus to cherish what one has while it lasts, to make the most of each day.
I started this book on Sunday morning and wished I hadn't as I had to go out and wanted to keep on reading. On Monday morning I read it - weeping - on the bus on my way to my sister's birthday lunch in the city. I had to force myself to shut the book before I wanted so as to leave time to recover and greet my sister without tears. I finished it last night and wanted to email Virginia at once to tell her how much I loved her story, how it had moved me. But how can you send an email like that to someone who has lost - and written about so beautifully - the love of their life?
Besides, I felt angry. I wanted more of John. I wanted to get to know him better before the book's pages closed. I wanted to hear him laugh, listen to the music he enjoyed, see the photos of his travels, get to know more of what made this Irish man so special to his wife, his family and many friends.
That's the brilliance of Lloyd's book. She doesn't just depict her grief, she creates it in the reader - she carries the reader into her heart, sharing with us her grief at not having had enough time with someone special, to live and love, to celebrate and explore, before it's all over and you're left with only memories.
[Read originally as part of the Australian Women Writers Challenge] in 2012.
The Young Widow's Guide to Home Improvement is both a love story and a memoir of loss. There are no surprises: it's all laid out in the title. The author Virginia Lloyd falls in love and discovers too soon that the illness which her beloved is being treated for is terminal. The memoir alternates between "after" - young widowhood - and "before" - courtship and newly wed. The pivotal moment is the death of John, Virginia's husband, way too soon at the age of 47.
But death isn't the book's theme. The book sings of love and grief, with a persistent chorus to cherish what one has while it lasts, to make the most of each day.
I started this book on Sunday morning and wished I hadn't as I had to go out and wanted to keep on reading. On Monday morning I read it - weeping - on the bus on my way to my sister's birthday lunch in the city. I had to force myself to shut the book before I wanted so as to leave time to recover and greet my sister without tears. I finished it last night and wanted to email Virginia at once to tell her how much I loved her story, how it had moved me. But how can you send an email like that to someone who has lost - and written about so beautifully - the love of their life?
Besides, I felt angry. I wanted more of John. I wanted to get to know him better before the book's pages closed. I wanted to hear him laugh, listen to the music he enjoyed, see the photos of his travels, get to know more of what made this Irish man so special to his wife, his family and many friends.
That's the brilliance of Lloyd's book. She doesn't just depict her grief, she creates it in the reader - she carries the reader into her heart, sharing with us her grief at not having had enough time with someone special, to live and love, to celebrate and explore, before it's all over and you're left with only memories.
[Read originally as part of the Australian Women Writers Challenge] in 2012.
September 8, 2011
Such a moving book. The author conveys such a feeling of intense devotion between her and her husband as they battle through the final stages of her husband's secondary cancer.
It's amazing what love does to a person. It can fill you with such hope that even terminal cancer doesn't faze you and you dive head-on into cohabitation and marriage.
This is a book about cancer, death, grief and describes a fleeting yet beautiful love story.
It's amazing what love does to a person. It can fill you with such hope that even terminal cancer doesn't faze you and you dive head-on into cohabitation and marriage.
This is a book about cancer, death, grief and describes a fleeting yet beautiful love story.
November 2, 2008
A moving but not maudlin meditation on love and death, beautifully structured and written with grace and understatement. It's astonishing to realise that John and Virginia lived a whole life in just two years, and heartbreaking to know how much life and love they could and should have had together.
August 27, 2011
I was glued to this book for probably the first three quarters, but then found myself reading the rest "just to get it finished". I'm stuck between "it was ok" and "i liked it".
March 2, 2019
This is the type of book I love to read.
I like the metaphor of her life and renovating her house.
It's a sad story in many ways, but uplifting at others.
The author has not shied away from writing about the emotions that we hard and painful.
But the joy in her words, as she describes John are so lovely.
I like the metaphor of her life and renovating her house.
It's a sad story in many ways, but uplifting at others.
The author has not shied away from writing about the emotions that we hard and painful.
But the joy in her words, as she describes John are so lovely.
February 11, 2018
I am still thinking about John and Virginia. I want to know more about them. I think it's a real testimony to her; they are friends that I am interested in. I finished it through an Australian Day concert because I couldn't put it down. Really well done
October 24, 2015
Once in a while I search for a book by an author that is not yet mainstream (or thrust in your face by Amazon, a Nobel Prize Winner) and I stumbled – happily I might add – across this non-fiction memoir.
A brief description: Virginia Lloyd imparts the story of her courtship and marriage to John (the love of her life) and his all-too-soon death at 47 years of age at the hands of cancer. The story shifts between their romance, which is tainted by John's encroaching, imminent demise, and her life as a young, new widow in the world, trying to make sense of what happened. That is, if she ever could.
The book has a brilliant, yet simple structure. Two parallel stories.
Story one, renovating her crumbling home after his death, which in itself is a wonderful metaphor for rebuilding her life. This is how the book also begins.
And two, their relationship, which runs through the entire gamut of human emotions, given the short time frame they have together, only two years. They embark on a marriage with an unwanted expiry date. A brave couple.
What makes this story great, rather than just good, is how the author tackles the subject of her bereavement. She makes no attempt to manipulate the reader by pulling on the heart strings. She simply tells the story with absolute candour. I didn't feel that she wanted pity or sympathy. It was as though she were cleansing herself, purifying her mind and paying homage to a truly wonderful man without over eulogizing. It was everything that a memoir such as this should be. Or any memoir for that matter.
By the end of the book I wanted to know more about the author and about John. I wish I had met him. John, the man who often wrote updates about his terminal illness for his friends. He called them the Cancer Boy Updates and he usually delivered them with an undercurrent of sarcasm and archaic satire.
Here's just one:
"On returning to Sydney, Paul, Maria and myself went out for a coffee through Leichhardt, which I have previously described as 'Little Italy'. I was in my wheelchair and decided to move into a 'proper chair' in the cafe. Whilst doing this, I heard a loud crack from my leg, which was soon joined by a mind-jarring amount of pain. I had broken the top of my femur!"
As the author had said:
"John's retrospective narratives of pain, with their slightly old-fashioned grammar and excited exclamation points, read like a Boy's Own adventure.
John maintained a sense of humour through to the terrible end.
If you think the main topic of the memoir is death, then you would be wrong. It is all about memories, good, bad, pretty and ugly, which is what makes us who we are.
Think of this book as a last song, or the final hymn to her then love. A beautiful way to remember somebody that you shared your life with and loved.
For me, the book had a poetic, singing quality. I felt as though the author could have unleash more literary skill had she wished to do so, but it wasn't needed in this case. The story was enough. A good judgment call.
There were countless sections that I would love to quote, but then I may as well give you the book. However, I will mention a few lines that struck a sensitive chord with me:
"These damp walls, this wet-soaked house, were such symbols as my grief was made on. I was living inside a metaphor."
"For me, on the other hand, a picture of health and in love with my husband, it was a severe and distressing loss that I had to mourn while John was still alive."
"Not many people are as lucky as you and me, John often said, with quiet conviction."
"For me this was a labour of love, though I didn't always love the labour."
"Time was concertinaing, slowing down and speeding up at once, compressing as we approached the end... But the end would arrive in the form of a steep decline, and we were accelerating without a clue as to when to expect it."
"Returning to the house after the renderer had completed his work, it was immediately evident that something had changed forever. Inside the shell of my house I felt like an astronaut walking through an alien landscape, denuded of signposts."
"Only at this moment did I realise how fully I had been using the house as the canvas on which to paint my grief."
"An old house that is also a new house, an ending and a beginning."
This was their mantra:
"As normal as possible for as long as possible."
Last one, I promise:
"The rest of my life will always be with John, and without him. He is a permanent absence that, like negative space, shapes my life. Sometimes it's difficult even for me to believe that the history of our private world – from beginning to end, and everything that happened in between – occurred in the space of two years."
I'll stop there.
Well, I certainly didn't do the novel the justice it deserves, but need I say more? I really liked the book... A LOT! and I hope the author has since moved on and is enjoying all that life has to offer.
I do hope that she reads this review, because she deserves the praise.
Bravo Virginia Lloyd.
Sergiu Pobereznic (author)
amazon.com/author/sergiupobereznic
A brief description: Virginia Lloyd imparts the story of her courtship and marriage to John (the love of her life) and his all-too-soon death at 47 years of age at the hands of cancer. The story shifts between their romance, which is tainted by John's encroaching, imminent demise, and her life as a young, new widow in the world, trying to make sense of what happened. That is, if she ever could.
The book has a brilliant, yet simple structure. Two parallel stories.
Story one, renovating her crumbling home after his death, which in itself is a wonderful metaphor for rebuilding her life. This is how the book also begins.
And two, their relationship, which runs through the entire gamut of human emotions, given the short time frame they have together, only two years. They embark on a marriage with an unwanted expiry date. A brave couple.
What makes this story great, rather than just good, is how the author tackles the subject of her bereavement. She makes no attempt to manipulate the reader by pulling on the heart strings. She simply tells the story with absolute candour. I didn't feel that she wanted pity or sympathy. It was as though she were cleansing herself, purifying her mind and paying homage to a truly wonderful man without over eulogizing. It was everything that a memoir such as this should be. Or any memoir for that matter.
By the end of the book I wanted to know more about the author and about John. I wish I had met him. John, the man who often wrote updates about his terminal illness for his friends. He called them the Cancer Boy Updates and he usually delivered them with an undercurrent of sarcasm and archaic satire.
Here's just one:
"On returning to Sydney, Paul, Maria and myself went out for a coffee through Leichhardt, which I have previously described as 'Little Italy'. I was in my wheelchair and decided to move into a 'proper chair' in the cafe. Whilst doing this, I heard a loud crack from my leg, which was soon joined by a mind-jarring amount of pain. I had broken the top of my femur!"
As the author had said:
"John's retrospective narratives of pain, with their slightly old-fashioned grammar and excited exclamation points, read like a Boy's Own adventure.
John maintained a sense of humour through to the terrible end.
If you think the main topic of the memoir is death, then you would be wrong. It is all about memories, good, bad, pretty and ugly, which is what makes us who we are.
Think of this book as a last song, or the final hymn to her then love. A beautiful way to remember somebody that you shared your life with and loved.
For me, the book had a poetic, singing quality. I felt as though the author could have unleash more literary skill had she wished to do so, but it wasn't needed in this case. The story was enough. A good judgment call.
There were countless sections that I would love to quote, but then I may as well give you the book. However, I will mention a few lines that struck a sensitive chord with me:
"These damp walls, this wet-soaked house, were such symbols as my grief was made on. I was living inside a metaphor."
"For me, on the other hand, a picture of health and in love with my husband, it was a severe and distressing loss that I had to mourn while John was still alive."
"Not many people are as lucky as you and me, John often said, with quiet conviction."
"For me this was a labour of love, though I didn't always love the labour."
"Time was concertinaing, slowing down and speeding up at once, compressing as we approached the end... But the end would arrive in the form of a steep decline, and we were accelerating without a clue as to when to expect it."
"Returning to the house after the renderer had completed his work, it was immediately evident that something had changed forever. Inside the shell of my house I felt like an astronaut walking through an alien landscape, denuded of signposts."
"Only at this moment did I realise how fully I had been using the house as the canvas on which to paint my grief."
"An old house that is also a new house, an ending and a beginning."
This was their mantra:
"As normal as possible for as long as possible."
Last one, I promise:
"The rest of my life will always be with John, and without him. He is a permanent absence that, like negative space, shapes my life. Sometimes it's difficult even for me to believe that the history of our private world – from beginning to end, and everything that happened in between – occurred in the space of two years."
I'll stop there.
Well, I certainly didn't do the novel the justice it deserves, but need I say more? I really liked the book... A LOT! and I hope the author has since moved on and is enjoying all that life has to offer.
I do hope that she reads this review, because she deserves the praise.
Bravo Virginia Lloyd.
Sergiu Pobereznic (author)
amazon.com/author/sergiupobereznic
December 1, 2019
Good read nothing special
July 5, 2020
Cried my eyes out reading this one
August 28, 2013
Review: The Young Widow’s Book of Home Improvement- A true story of love and renovation by Virginia Lloyd
Can you imagine waiting your whole life to meet the man of your dreams, to find that he had terminal cancer? The irony is not lost on Virginia Lloyd, who has written a powerful memoir about her journey from being single, to married and widowed all in a 2 year period. It is first and foremost a love story which takes the reader on a journey of the love between two people, who are aware that their time together is limited. It is also a journey in which a widow learns to rid the damp from her heart and learn that the love is contained within gives you the strength to go on.
Reading memoirs has been an important part of my healing, since my father died in 2012. I like the ones that lay their cards on the table, and invite you to delve in the murk. I want my heart to be ripped out again. I want to cry.
Virginia Lloyd’s memoir sucks you right in, and although you are reading the words of another person’s experience, it is as if you are living your own again. Your tears merge with the tears of the author as your grief intertwines. For me the experience is cathartic.
Virginia’s memoir leaves you feeling that even though you don’t know her, you have been through the experience with her. I know I am not alone in the desire to “check in” on her and see how she is going.
4.5 stars The first two chapters took a little while to understand the moving backwards and forwards between the past and present.
Can you imagine waiting your whole life to meet the man of your dreams, to find that he had terminal cancer? The irony is not lost on Virginia Lloyd, who has written a powerful memoir about her journey from being single, to married and widowed all in a 2 year period. It is first and foremost a love story which takes the reader on a journey of the love between two people, who are aware that their time together is limited. It is also a journey in which a widow learns to rid the damp from her heart and learn that the love is contained within gives you the strength to go on.
Reading memoirs has been an important part of my healing, since my father died in 2012. I like the ones that lay their cards on the table, and invite you to delve in the murk. I want my heart to be ripped out again. I want to cry.
Virginia Lloyd’s memoir sucks you right in, and although you are reading the words of another person’s experience, it is as if you are living your own again. Your tears merge with the tears of the author as your grief intertwines. For me the experience is cathartic.
Virginia’s memoir leaves you feeling that even though you don’t know her, you have been through the experience with her. I know I am not alone in the desire to “check in” on her and see how she is going.
4.5 stars The first two chapters took a little while to understand the moving backwards and forwards between the past and present.
November 8, 2015
This title caught my eye in an op shop just after my baby sister tragically lost her husband. I thought I might get something out of it, but set it aside less than half way through as I was getting nothing out of it and I wasn’t liking the author.
I’m doing the Pop Sugar reading challenge and one category is “a book you started and never finished” so I came back to this after about 9 months (it’s the only book I had never finished). I didn’t dislike it as much once I got going again. As it turned out there weren’t many similarities between my sister and the author as young widows. My sister had been married for nearly 5 years, with a 3yo and baby. The author’s husband had terminal cancer when they met and they didn’t have children… But then, the authors husband was buried in the same cemetery as my sister’s husband, and at one point she talks about choosing wording for the headstone, and mentions how many letters were included in the headstone cost and how much extra it cost for additional letters. That was uncanny as I had recently gone through the same thing with my sister and I was frustrated that the paperwork didn’t say how much additional letters were (from memory the price has gone up since the book was written, but still uncanny!).
Her husband is portrayed as a lovely selfless man and I did cry when I read about his last days and hours. But it’s not a book I would recommend.
I’m doing the Pop Sugar reading challenge and one category is “a book you started and never finished” so I came back to this after about 9 months (it’s the only book I had never finished). I didn’t dislike it as much once I got going again. As it turned out there weren’t many similarities between my sister and the author as young widows. My sister had been married for nearly 5 years, with a 3yo and baby. The author’s husband had terminal cancer when they met and they didn’t have children… But then, the authors husband was buried in the same cemetery as my sister’s husband, and at one point she talks about choosing wording for the headstone, and mentions how many letters were included in the headstone cost and how much extra it cost for additional letters. That was uncanny as I had recently gone through the same thing with my sister and I was frustrated that the paperwork didn’t say how much additional letters were (from memory the price has gone up since the book was written, but still uncanny!).
Her husband is portrayed as a lovely selfless man and I did cry when I read about his last days and hours. But it’s not a book I would recommend.
February 24, 2012
I enjoy reading biographies but usually try to stay away from "sad" ones. I read a review of this book in Good Reading magazine so reserved it thinking that perhaps it would be good to step out of my comfort zone and try a tear jerker for a change. However, Young Widow's Book.. is not a tear jerker as such but a young woman's journey through her grief at loosing her new husband to cancer (she did know he had cancer when they married). Using the rising damp in her house and it's repair as symbolism for her dealing with grief - the book is not one that leaves the reader in tears but one that opens a reader's mind to how one person has dealt with grief. I can't say that I enjoyed it as I would my usual array of books but I read it in one day which usually means it's a good book.
January 9, 2018
There was a nice idea behind this, in running the parallels between working to repair yourself through grieving, and in working to repair an old damaged home. Sometimes I did feel a bit like it was trying too hard to focus on this, rather than to just tell the story, but overall this was quite a touching memoir, moving back and forth between the relationship, marriage and illness; and her life as it moved forward afterwards. This is one of the things that scares me most in the world, and there is a sense, however misguided, that reading about it will somehow prepare or protect me. Not at all true of course, but perhaps there is some comfort in knowing that others go through it and find a way to survive it.
December 17, 2008
This is a lovely book about a modern romance that is tragically cut short, though the bride knew she was marrying a man with terminal cancer, and her subsequent renovation of their home due to excessive moisture. It was probably not the best for me to read this so close to the first anniversary of my brother's death. At one point she brought back the pain of his last moments so vividly I almost dropped the book (at the community pool!). But I am glad I read it and glad she shared her story. It helped me get into the head of my brother's girlfriend. She is a good writer and I wish her all the best as she continues to move forward in her life.
March 2, 2011
I found this book making me want to read on to find out how the author's difficult life was progressing. Well written and I felt like I was listening to a friend I had a very deep friendship with. No holds barred story.
Good to see an Australian author produce such a great book.
I read the hardback version of the book and was immediately drawn to the cover which was simple but effective but raised paper (not sure of what the right name is for this type of artwork to paper) which made the Jasmine and butterfly on the cover seem stand out and drew me to it.
Good to see an Australian author produce such a great book.
I read the hardback version of the book and was immediately drawn to the cover which was simple but effective but raised paper (not sure of what the right name is for this type of artwork to paper) which made the Jasmine and butterfly on the cover seem stand out and drew me to it.
July 16, 2008
This was one of the most moving books I've read about a love affair, a couple grappling with an old house in need of love and care and then a partner in desperate need of love and care, as a terrible illness robbed the couple of a life together. And yet in the two short years they had together Llloyd, in her compelling memoir has managed to cram a lifetime of experiences and portray their journey as something positive
July 19, 2008
This is the most amazing story (true!) about a young Sydney woman who was single at 32, married at 33 and a widow at 34. Her husband died of cancer and her house was falling down round their ears...it's the story of her journey during and after his illness and death.
This is the most beautiful book I have ever read and despite it being sad, it is a fantastic love story.
This is the most beautiful book I have ever read and despite it being sad, it is a fantastic love story.
February 6, 2009
Virginia Lloyd was single at 32, married at 33 and widowed at 34. This book is her true story. I whizzed through this book in one day and I just could not put it down. Although it centres around Virgina's husband John's death from cancer, the book wasn't sad and morbid. In fact, quite the opposite. I found the story really uplifting and sweet.
August 4, 2013
I read this book in 2008 after a bad break up, it was cathartic and I cried and cried with Virginia for lost dreams and lost lives, heartbreak and the agony of losing the love of your life.
May not be everyone's cup of tea but I loved this book and the poem at the beginning is wonderful and full of meaning and sentiment for me.
May not be everyone's cup of tea but I loved this book and the poem at the beginning is wonderful and full of meaning and sentiment for me.
December 4, 2013
Not a dry eye present after reading this. This book tells an honest account of not only the psychological effects, but also the lifestyle changes of grief and palliative care. However I did find the home improvement narrative a bit drawn out.
Worth a read.
Worth a read.
Read
December 8, 2009This is a beautifully written book, i really loved it. Great to read a Sydney book, but it was sad!
December 22, 2009
Sad but ultimately hopeful memoir. Inspires me to fully live each day.
March 1, 2010
loved this - so moving.
July 13, 2010
What a beautiful book...
July 14, 2010
Not bad - as always, I wanted to know what happened next but a warm, funny and heartbreaking memoir. I would recommend this book.
December 31, 2010
Went too long
March 2, 2016
A good book. Virginia Lloyd is wonderfully open about dealing with grief.
August 7, 2011
I seem to be drawn to books about grief and loss, even when they are the worst thing in the world for me to read.
This was a good book, but I shouldn't have read it.
This was a good book, but I shouldn't have read it.
January 22, 2012
Tells the story of Virginia's short relationship with her husband, who suffers bone cancer, and her efforts to renovate their run-down house after his death.
Displaying 1 - 30 of 32 reviews