The Best Days of Our Lives: the big-hearted and uplifting new novel from the bestselling author of Anything Could Happen

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It is definitely full on with the emotions, and potentially a bit too much. If they’re sad, they’re distraught, if they’re a bit lost then they’re mad. Everything is dialled up to such an extreme that it doesn’t always feel in keeping with the characters. However, her description of grief is perfect. I’ve experienced grief in a number of ways and it can present in the most bizarre of situations and the strangest of times, but she’s definitely hit the mark with that. She doesn’t sugar coat the grief but she is equally very sensitive about it. Somehow, this is the first of Lucy Diamond’s books I’ve read. I know of her and I’ve seen her books and often been interest in them, but for reasons unknown to me, I have never actually read one. But I was very eager to read this one.

Leni drives the narrative, making her relationships with the other characters shape them and bring them to vibrant life. I loved meeting them all because they are messy, flawed and human. No one writes about family like Lucy does. This is a masterpiece in how broken people negotiate and ultimately survive the worst that life can throw at them. It's an absolutely beautiful book * Milly Johnson * Thank you to Net Galley and the publishers for allowing me to read an advanced reader copy before publication date! 😊 One thing I really liked was how everyone’s stories were interconnected. It’s unsurprising that the parent’s and children’s stories link as they’ve all lost the same person, but there are some secondary characters that pop up here and there that help tie it all together. It helps create this sense of community and the importance of friendship and love.The Nottingham-born writer took her first draft to the agent she’d worked with on her children’s books. “He told me not to give up the day job,” she reveals. “I tried another who was intimidatingly posh. She asked me, ‘darling how can I market you, are you poor?’ So, I went with someone else who signed me up with a publisher. It was a happy ending.” Even better is the sensation of being let into other secrets not all the characters know, but I won’t spoil the story by saying more! Reminding us how to fly Bob Mortimer wins 2023 Bollinger Everyman Wodehouse Prize for Comic Fiction with The Satsuma Complex

Belinda is dealing with her grief in a different way and her partner Ray is extremely worried about her. Hours spent talking to Leni through a psychic hotline may be bringing Belinda comfort but deep down surely she must know that this is not real at all? She may be finding short term comfort but long-term acceptance seems very far away. As her ex-husband Tony seems to have had a revelation/wake up call when it comes to his own life situation Belinda starts to realise things from the past which she desperately wanted kept hidden could be about to break through the surface. Can a lid be kept on something she and someone else have been sitting on for years? Or will a new can of worms be opened up? Alice, her sister and best friend, riddled with guilt over their silence following an earlier argument, tries to piece together the last days of Leni’s life, while baby brother Will is living fast and lose in Thailand trying to forget the part he played in their sister’s death. Meanwhile, mum Belinda falls into an unhealthy relationship with a clairvoyant as her ex, Tony, struggles with becoming a father again after a trio of failed marriages.There’s such depth that it’s hard to accept that all the people here – Alice, Belinda and Will in particular – are not real people. I felt their emotions every bit as much as they did because I believed in them so completely. The mystery of Leni’s last few weeks Where I’m most conflicted though, is in regards to the character of Leni. We know that she dies early doors (no spoiler - it’s right there in the synopsis), but there’s not real transformation from her being there to not. And part of me would like more depth to her character and more of her story, rather than the drip feeding we get. On the other hand, the main crux of the story lies on her sister, Alice, trying to uncover the last weeks of Leni’s life, and by keeping us in the dark too, it puts us on the same journey, so I can understand why it’s written like that, but it doesn’t stop me wanting more.