Book Review - The Brightest Star in the Sky by Marian Keyes - Rachel Reads Randomly Book #89

Amazon UK

Title: The Brightest Star In The Sky

Author: Marian Keyes

Format reviewed: Ebook

Source: Purchased

Publisher: Penguin

Publication Date: 3rd February 2011

Rating: 4 Stars

'June the first, a bright summer's evening, a Monday . . .'

And into the busy, bustling homes at 66 Star Street slips, unseen, a mysterious visitor. As the couples, flatmates and repentant singletons of No. 66 fall in and out of love, clutch at and drop secrets, laugh, cry and simply try to live, no one suspects the visitor patiently waiting in the wings. For soon, as the light slowly fades to dark, everything is going to change . . .

It has been a while since I last read a book by Marian Keyes, so I really wasn't sure what to expect from this one. Since I was reading on my kindle I initially didn't quite realise just how long it was.  For at 640 pages it is certainly one of the longest books I have read in a long while. 

Despite the length my attention was caught pretty much from the beginning where the book started on Day 61 and counted down to Day 0 - so the whole story took place over the course of two months and it featured the lives of everyone living at No. 66 Star Street. 

It is a large mix of people and their circumstances were all really different, it is always fascinating to see what goes on behind closed doors in numerous residences at the same time.  Also curious to see just how their lives all intersected.  

But what captured my interest the most, and what kept me reading and reading to find out more, was just what the omniscient voice was - was it a ghost, a spirit, a figment of someone's imagination, a fly on the wall or all of that and more? 

This is a rather clever book that at times will make you laugh, and at others make you want to cry. However  of the books I have read by this talented author, it is still the books in the Walsh Family series that are my favourites. 

There was just too much to this one, some of the characters took me absolutely ages to warm to, and with the viewpoints changing rapidly I'm just impressed I didn't tend to get them confused as they all had distinct personalities and voices. 

Thank you to everyone that voted for this two weeks ago, I'm glad that I read the book just wish it hadn't taken me over 3 days to do so, when I have a massive review stack waiting for me anyway.  Ah well, hopefully you will pick me something as enjoyable but more manageable in length this week. 

Book Review - The Woman Who Stole My Life by Marian Keyes - Rachel Read's Randomly Book #22

Amazon UK

Title: The Woman Who Stole My Life

Author: Marian Keyes

Format reviewed: Paperback

Source: Purchased

Publisher: Penguin

Publication Date: 21st May 2015

Rating: 4 Stars

One day, sitting in traffic, married Dublin mum Stella Sweeney attempts a good deed. The resulting car crash changes her life.

For she meets a man who wants her telephone number (for the insurance, it turns out). That's okay. She doesn't really like him much anyway (his Range Rover totally banjaxed her car).
But in this meeting is born the seed of something which will take Stella thousands of miles from her old life, turning an ordinary woman into a superstar, and, along the way, wrenching her whole family apart.
Is this all because of one ill-advised act of goodwill? Was meeting Mr Range Rover destiny or karma? Should she be grateful or hopping mad?

For the first time real, honest-to-goodness happiness is just within her reach. But is Stella Sweeney, Dublin housewife, ready to grasp it?

Recently I have seen a lot of mixed feeling for this book, so it was with apprehension that I started to read. Well I absolutely loved the first part of the book, mainly for the main background setting scenes. As the story progressed though although I understood the title a lot better, I was finding that although I was happy to continue reading, it just didn't really hook me as the beginning did. 

I think what intrigued me about the first section of the book, was Stella's contraction of and dealing with a terrible illness, that left her unable to do anything for month on end apart from blink. With the aid of a neurologist who works out a way of communicating with her by blinking, they start to have conversations. All the while we get to see inside Stella's head and how was was feeling while being in hospital. It's this neurologist who turns out to be quite key the remainder of the story. 

Stella is just an ordinary person who after her extreme illness, discovers that with the help of a certain someone, her communications while in hospital have been put together as a book, and from that her life transforms in even more ways. 

Unfortunately I found I didn't really care that much for the rest of Stella's family, her husband is incredibly self centred, although the present day chapters show he has a big idea for proving karma exists, and in a way provides a bit of comic relief at the sheer stupidity of his plan. 

I did find it a bit weird how at times Stella had to keep relying on babysitters, despite with the approximate ages of the children, they could have easily been trusted overnight, or for a few hours in an evening, they were mid to late teens even at the start of the book, and weren't the trouble making sort. 

This was the first standalone Marian Keyes book I have read, after having read the entire Walsh series. I did on the whole really enjoy the book, I found it did have some interesting changes of direction that made it quite unpredictable at times, and definitely had that that style of storytelling that seems to always appear in Irish writing. 

Thank you to everyone who voted this week. It was a tie between this and the Cathy Kelly, and I picked this in part due to all the comments on the Cathy Kelly votes saying they weren't as keen on the Marian Keyes, and it made me very curious  as to what my opinion would be! I hope to see you all taking part in this weeks vote that has already started.