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Days of Awe
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The celebrated author of Friends Like Us now gives us a raw, achingly funny novel about a woman who, after the death of her best friend, must face the crisis in her marriage, the fury of her almost-teenage daughter, and the possibility that she might open her cantankerous heart to someone new.
Only a year ago Isabel Moore was married, the object of adoration of her ten-year ...more
Only a year ago Isabel Moore was married, the object of adoration of her ten-year ...more
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Update.... $1.99 Kindle Special... This was a gem of a book!!!! I’d buy it and read it in a second for the price cheaper than a cup of coffee any day - if I didn’t already own. It’s filled with emotions- much to think about - very well written!!!
“Death smashes a crater into your life, and you're left alone to sort through the ramble. But here's something else I figured out in the long months after Josie died: she would always be my wild, grieving, huge-hearted, selfish, confident, insecure, ext ...more
“Death smashes a crater into your life, and you're left alone to sort through the ramble. But here's something else I figured out in the long months after Josie died: she would always be my wild, grieving, huge-hearted, selfish, confident, insecure, ext ...more
Jun 11, 2015
Angela M
rated it
really liked it
·
review of another edition
Shelves:
netgalley-reviews
Isabel Moore is having her share of in your face life events . She is haunted by her past miscarriages and her best friend is dead. Her marriage is falling apart and her mother has had a stroke. She has a pre-teen daughter who is confiding in her father and not in her. I kept wondering if there could be anything else ! The story focuses on how Isabel is trying to cope . In flashbacks we learn about her childhood, the early years of her marriage to Chris and about how she and Josie become best fr ...more
Really liked this...review to come.
"Life goes on, for the living."
This was a delightful read for what on the contrary was also about loss and grieving, and moving on. I should preface this by saying I started out listening to the audiobook up until about the halfway mark and was a little confused at times due to the meandering thoughts so I picked up the paper version. But in listening I grew to appreciate the narrator’s voice and spunky attitude which I’m not sure would have been as easily capt ...more
"Life goes on, for the living."
This was a delightful read for what on the contrary was also about loss and grieving, and moving on. I should preface this by saying I started out listening to the audiobook up until about the halfway mark and was a little confused at times due to the meandering thoughts so I picked up the paper version. But in listening I grew to appreciate the narrator’s voice and spunky attitude which I’m not sure would have been as easily capt ...more
3.5 Isabel Moore, a young woman in her early forties, trying to pick up the piece after her best friend's death, her husbands leaving and her daughters new not very nice attitude towards her. Very appealing characters, very accessible writing. Isabel tends to think things she should say and doesn't, and tends to say things in circumstances she shouldn't. She is so very real, flawed and vulnerable.
Her comments and thoughts, some of which I quoted in my updates, are at times absurdly amusing at o ...more
Her comments and thoughts, some of which I quoted in my updates, are at times absurdly amusing at o ...more
A high 4 stars! Once I got into Days of Awe, I felt glued to it. I didn't want to stop reading, and when I had to put it down from to time to time to deal with the real world, I felt permeated by the sad emotional charge of the book. Told from Izzie's perspective, at the beginning of the book we quickly find out that Izzie's best friend Josie died recently, that Izzie and her husband Chris are recently separated, that Josie was married to Mark, and that there are complicated emotions between Izz
...more
Aug 09, 2015
Jennifer
rated it
it was amazing
·
review of another edition
Shelves:
2015-coffee-books-challenge
Can a book about grief be funny? Yes. It can be funny, and heartfelt, and nostalgic, and clever, and unbearably sad all wrapped up together. Lauren Fox pulls this off brilliantly in her new book “Days of Awe.”
On the surface, we see main character Isabel Moore face of year of grief and struggle: the death of her best friend, the demise of her marriage, the frailty of her aging mother, and the growing resentment of her tween daughter. But Fox isn’t content to let the story sit on the surface. She ...more
On the surface, we see main character Isabel Moore face of year of grief and struggle: the death of her best friend, the demise of her marriage, the frailty of her aging mother, and the growing resentment of her tween daughter. But Fox isn’t content to let the story sit on the surface. She ...more
Sep 01, 2015
Cathrine ☯️
rated it
really liked it
·
review of another edition
Recommended to Cathrine ☯️ by:
Jennifer
4 Stars
Processing thoughts on this his one a bit of a challenge as I was also watching the film version of Olive Kitteridge. Simultaneously watching and reading the two story lines of women unraveling was at times emotionally taxing, too revealing. The rawness portrayed was so genuine, at times tragic and humorous, moody and uncomfortable. Did I use enough adjectives? If I knew these women in real life I might say, “Too much information; I've got issues of my own."
The writing was first rate and ...more
Processing thoughts on this his one a bit of a challenge as I was also watching the film version of Olive Kitteridge. Simultaneously watching and reading the two story lines of women unraveling was at times emotionally taxing, too revealing. The rawness portrayed was so genuine, at times tragic and humorous, moody and uncomfortable. Did I use enough adjectives? If I knew these women in real life I might say, “Too much information; I've got issues of my own."
The writing was first rate and ...more
Lauren Fox’s new novel, “Days of Awe,” starts with a funeral, but it’s a lot more nimble than that procession to the grave would suggest. Fox is a master of emotional misdirection, and what she presents here tastes like carbonated grief, an elixir of sorrow gassed up with her nervous humor.
The whole story takes place in the shadow of mourning. Isabel Moore, the narrator, has just lost her best friend, a delightfully irreverent woman named Josie. She was a fellow middle school teacher, but, more ...more
The whole story takes place in the shadow of mourning. Isabel Moore, the narrator, has just lost her best friend, a delightfully irreverent woman named Josie. She was a fellow middle school teacher, but, more ...more
I've received this novel via NetGalley in exchange for an honest review. Many thanks to Knopf Doubleday Publishing Group for the opportunity to read and review.
Some novels strike too close to home, and this was definitely one of those. Isabel is a 40 something-year-old teacher, who's grieving the loss of her best friend, Josie. Isabel finds it difficult to move on. Josie had been an important part of her life for the past 15 years. Meanwhile, her 15 year marriage to Chris is falling apart. Her ...more
Some novels strike too close to home, and this was definitely one of those. Isabel is a 40 something-year-old teacher, who's grieving the loss of her best friend, Josie. Isabel finds it difficult to move on. Josie had been an important part of her life for the past 15 years. Meanwhile, her 15 year marriage to Chris is falling apart. Her ...more
They say tragedies often happen in threes, and that's precisely what has happened to Isabel Moore. Following her best friend Josie's tragic death in a car accident, Isabel's life has been further turned upside down by the imminent demise of her marriage, and the fact that her preteen daughter Hannah is starting to hate her.
"Death smashes a crater into your life, and you're left alone to sort through the rubble."
In Days of Awe , Lauren Fox examines the life of a woman who thought she had every ...more
"Death smashes a crater into your life, and you're left alone to sort through the rubble."
In Days of Awe , Lauren Fox examines the life of a woman who thought she had every ...more
A really enjoyable read even given the book's darkness. I liked and identified with 43 year old Isabel, especially her sense of morbid humor, her Midwestern sensibility and even her self-pity. This book felt completely familiar to me, in a good way.
...more
“Life was a tender accumulation of possessions, quickly discarded.”
Days of Awe was a surprisingly entertaining, fun read for a novel about loss. With a good combination of grief and humor, I found myself feeling sad then laughing out loud! Isabel, the main character, was someone I could well relate to.
I loved Fox’s style of writing and her many thought-provoking sentences ...in which I found myself ‘dog-earing’ several pages. It is a quick little insightful read that hooked me from start to fin ...more
Days of Awe was a surprisingly entertaining, fun read for a novel about loss. With a good combination of grief and humor, I found myself feeling sad then laughing out loud! Isabel, the main character, was someone I could well relate to.
I loved Fox’s style of writing and her many thought-provoking sentences ...in which I found myself ‘dog-earing’ several pages. It is a quick little insightful read that hooked me from start to fin ...more
This is a contemporary novel that I just randomly picked up (while avoiding my forever long TBR pile). I’ll have to say that, even though the characters and the plot never felt fully developed, i did enjoy the story.
Judaism 101---The ten days starting with Rosh Hashanah and ending with Yom Kippur are commonly known as the Days of Awe (Yamim Noraim) or the Days of Repentance. This is a time for serious introspection, a time to consider the sins of the previous year and repent before Yom Kippur.
This fine novel is an exercise in introspection. It’s the musings of a middle-aged woman whose life is altering before her eyes, which causes her to pause, and redefine herself. Her best friend dies, her husband wants ...more
This fine novel is an exercise in introspection. It’s the musings of a middle-aged woman whose life is altering before her eyes, which causes her to pause, and redefine herself. Her best friend dies, her husband wants ...more
This is another one of those books that I loved reading, but fell a little flat for me in the end. The prose is fantastic, and Josie's character is so vivid I felt like I knew her, this seemed like two separate books to me. And without enough of a bridge to connect the two, I felt a little confused and disoriented by the end.
Still a fun read, and very witty, Fox's commentary on marriage, parenthood, and friendship reminded me of the novels of Liane Moriarty. Though this one isn't a favorite, I' ...more
Still a fun read, and very witty, Fox's commentary on marriage, parenthood, and friendship reminded me of the novels of Liane Moriarty. Though this one isn't a favorite, I' ...more
Received from NetGalley:
I realize the dangers of reading anything into supplied author biographies, when I read what Lauren Fox wrote about herself--basically that she grew up in a happy and supportive family, then hit the emotional wall with college age unsuccessful romances--that for some people writing about the gradual disintegration of personalities or relationships is interesting. And leaving the pieces lying there is hip and moderns because that's all there is, right?
Well, I don't want to ...more
I realize the dangers of reading anything into supplied author biographies, when I read what Lauren Fox wrote about herself--basically that she grew up in a happy and supportive family, then hit the emotional wall with college age unsuccessful romances--that for some people writing about the gradual disintegration of personalities or relationships is interesting. And leaving the pieces lying there is hip and moderns because that's all there is, right?
Well, I don't want to ...more
A novel about grief shouldn't be this entertaining. But this one is!
...more
A confident writing style—frequent use of colourful descriptions, enough to set the scene, though unusual at times—yet no word choice could save a book devoid of captivating story, and switching between flashbacks and the present, inexplicably removing a definite answer of where many of the chapters took place. Days of Awe tells the life of Isabel Moore, who has lost her best friend Josie to a car accident; as she grieves the loss, along with her sort-of-ex-husband moving out and daughter growin
...more
Oh so close to 5 stars on this one. I loved everything about this book, even the sad subject matter. I could totally relate to the main character and her battle with grief. This book is real life on the page told in masterful prose. Would not have wanted to miss out on this one. Definitely recommend.
Book on CD read by Luci Christian
Isabel Moore’s life has been upended in this last year. Her husband moved out, her daughter has become a sullen pre-teen, and her best friend died in a tragic auto accident. Now she has to figure out who she is and what she wants in life.
This is the kind of character-driven novel I really enjoy. As Isabel reflects on past events and her relationships with best friend Josie, daughter Hannah, and ex-husband Chris, the reader comes to know her. I felt her confusio ...more
Isabel Moore’s life has been upended in this last year. Her husband moved out, her daughter has become a sullen pre-teen, and her best friend died in a tragic auto accident. Now she has to figure out who she is and what she wants in life.
This is the kind of character-driven novel I really enjoy. As Isabel reflects on past events and her relationships with best friend Josie, daughter Hannah, and ex-husband Chris, the reader comes to know her. I felt her confusio ...more
A story about grief and griefs effect on people's lives, usually leading to more grief. There are some interesting, and even funny, passes sprinkled throughout. There is even hope. I liked the writing and the unfolding of this somewhat difficult topic. Thank you Net Galley for the ARC.
...more
NOTHING happens in this book. I felt like the author was telling a story that had potential but characters/plot never got developed enough to be engaging.
Lauren Fox' latest novel, "Days of Awe", is the first of her novels I've read; I was lured to her by the descriptions of her witty and insightful style. I was not disappointed!
Isabel's best friend Josie (both in their early 40s), has been killed in a car crash and the story revolves around Isabel's coping with grief and guilt, along with the dissolution of her marriage to Chris, and the fracture of her long-time friendship with Josie's widower, Mark. Throughout the novel there are hints and fore ...more
Isabel's best friend Josie (both in their early 40s), has been killed in a car crash and the story revolves around Isabel's coping with grief and guilt, along with the dissolution of her marriage to Chris, and the fracture of her long-time friendship with Josie's widower, Mark. Throughout the novel there are hints and fore ...more
Days of Awe is a story about 40-something-year old Izzy Moore, a woman struggling to cope after her best friend, Josie, dies in a random (and somewhat mysterious) car accident. Her inability to deal with her friend’s death has put extra strain on her already strained marriage, and, eventually, her husband decides to move out. To top it off, Izzy’s fragile emotional state has also hurt her relationship with her tween daughter, Hannah, and the two seem to be slowly, but resolutely, moving away fro
...more
Jun 19, 2015
Patti
rated it
it was ok
·
review of another edition
Shelves:
literary-fiction,
women-s-fiction
Isabel Moore, in her early forties, is an elementary school teacher in Milwaukee. Her best friend has died, she is recently divorced, and her adolescent daughter is going through the usual angst with life. Basically, Isabel is sad and trying to pull herself out of depression. This is not a plot driven book, the main events are laid out right at the beginning and the rest is a focus on Isabel's internal struggles and some poor discussions she makes in an attempt to pull herself out of her mid-li
...more
Aug 07, 2015
Kristina
rated it
did not like it
·
review of another edition
Shelves:
contemporary-fiction,
2015
Days of Awe by Lauren Fox is the story of Isabel Applebaum Moore. Her best friend, Josie Abrams, just passed away, and Isabel has to go on with her life. Isabel and her husband, Christopher Moore are separated (though they sometimes have quickie sex). Their daughter, Hannah is not getting along with Isabel. She has hit the temperamental tween years (eleven going on twelve). Isabel has to find a way to get over her grief from losing her best friend and the dissolution of her fifteen year marriage
...more
Days of Awe by Lauren Fox is a very highly recommended novel about loss and change. What Lauren Fox presents us with is a year in a woman's life; a year of loss when her world and family is changing dramatically.
Isabel Applebaum Moore and Josie Abrams met as teachers at Rhodes Avenue Middle School and quickly became best friends. Izzy even introduced Josie to her childhood friend, Mark, and he and Josie married. But now Josie has died in a car crash, leaving a hole in Izzy's life. She is underst ...more
Isabel Applebaum Moore and Josie Abrams met as teachers at Rhodes Avenue Middle School and quickly became best friends. Izzy even introduced Josie to her childhood friend, Mark, and he and Josie married. But now Josie has died in a car crash, leaving a hole in Izzy's life. She is underst ...more
Full review at: http://everydayiwritethebookblog.com/...
Days of Awe by Lauren Fox is one of the best books I have read so far in 2016.
Isabel Moore is a fortysomething teacher in Wisconsin facing loss on a number of levels. Her best friend Josie died a year ago in a car accident. Her marriage has fallen apart and her husband Chris has moved out. Her daughter Hannah has hit adolescence and is pulling away. And she's still grieving a series of miscarriages that denied her the second child she alway ...more
Days of Awe by Lauren Fox is one of the best books I have read so far in 2016.
Isabel Moore is a fortysomething teacher in Wisconsin facing loss on a number of levels. Her best friend Josie died a year ago in a car accident. Her marriage has fallen apart and her husband Chris has moved out. Her daughter Hannah has hit adolescence and is pulling away. And she's still grieving a series of miscarriages that denied her the second child she alway ...more
Thanks to Knopf and Netgalley for the opportunity to read this novel; you can read my full review here: http://wp.me/p4EAyf-1qO
Have you noticed that when someone dies most people encourage friends and family to "think about the good times" or remember the pleasant things about their experience of the individual? Similarly, I've never been to a funeral where there were disparaging comments made about the deceased; I think people assume that would be "disrespectful." During my tenure as a clinical ...more
Have you noticed that when someone dies most people encourage friends and family to "think about the good times" or remember the pleasant things about their experience of the individual? Similarly, I've never been to a funeral where there were disparaging comments made about the deceased; I think people assume that would be "disrespectful." During my tenure as a clinical ...more
Jun 26, 2015
Sarah Obsesses over Books & Cookies
rated it
really liked it
·
review of another edition
This is a book about friendship, mourning, loss, parenting and accepting your life. It was good, a little dry but good like champagne. Lauren Fox throws a little bit of everything so as not to make something too sad- because despite it being about the death of a best friend, it's not sad. It's more real because obviously you'd grieve and you'd do a self assessment wondering what the hell life is about if you can't share your thoughts with your friend anymore--but then one day you might not be mo
...more
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“And here’s something else I learned: you lose some people that way—fast and blinding. But some people inch away from you slowly, in barely discernible steps. In the end it almost doesn’t matter. They’re just as gone.”
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“In our marriage—in every marriage?—no annoyed glance holds only the displeasure of the moment. Each one reflects all the irritated glances he’s ever shot at me for all of my transgressions: for lacking discipline, for being brittle and sharp, for overreacting, for swearing all the time, even in front of Hannah, for letting my worst self porcupine out before I retract my quills. Every exasperated look Chris gives me—and there have been plenty—carries the sediment of all the displeasure that has accumulated over the past fifteen years.”
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