The Woman who Went to Bed for a Year (Penguin Picks)

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Predictably, a wife and mother isn't allowed to hide in plain sight without meeting some fairly fierce opposition. Who will cook Brian's dinners, or iron his shirts, or creosote the new fence? Who will keep remote tabs on their twins, mathematical prodigies whose asocial tendencies mean that they are unlikely to slip easily into the swim of college life? Completing the family tableau are Eva's mother Ruby and her mother-in-law Yvonne, neither of them particularly reliable sources of support; and Eva soon finds herself confronted with a mixture of outrage and puzzled disbelief. Oh gosh. I hate to disparage an author's hard work. I hate to be negative when I consider how much time, effort and soul has gone into writing it. I've enjoyed Townsend's other work, Adrian Mole was hilarious. However, if I can save you from wasting your time reading this book then perhaps it is the fairest thing I can do. Well, it's one of those books that keeps one reading hoping that the ending might be worth it. It wasn't. It just ended. I'm sure the author had fun writing it, and I had fun reading it. But there was much more than just fun behind those well-written words. Egy jó könyvbe belemerülni most kb. olyan mértékű kikapcsolódás és feltöltődés, mint máskor egy nehéz nap végén beülni valahova barátokkal vagy elmenni valami kulturális eseményre. Beautifully and intelligently written as you would expect from Sue Townsend, it is in places briefly uplifting yet on the whole seemed to be a slightly melancholy, cautionary tale which serves as a reminder that we are all the same underneath all of our learnings and affectations and that we all seek that one person who understands us and accepts us for who we really are.

Irritatingly non-pc, the TV presenter Derek. So this reader was pleased to hear that he can be discombobulated: Sue Townsend tries to be clever with The Woman Who Went To Bed For A Year and is making an obvious effort to straddle comedy, drama, tragedy and social commentary. Unfortunately, the effort is more obvious than the result and the tone is uncomfortable throughout. The book won a 2012 Bollinger Everyman Wodehouse Prize for comedy. And it was indeed a rip of modern dysfunctional, dismantled families, drowned in -isms and postmodern practices. The woman in the bed inspired different reactions from different readers, like a Rorschach test of reality. It was also a litmus test of ourselves. Where do we stand on it all right this moment in our lives. Do we condemn or condone her behavior? Do we misunderstand all the characters? Have we lost it? None of them were really likable folks. Perhaps the author made fun of all the futile, senseless, empty choices people make and the sadness of lives wasted in vain. Bestselling author Sue Townsend has been Britain's favourite comic writer for over three decades, The Woman Who Went to Bed for a Year is her hilarious new novel. On the day that her 17 year old twins move to university in Leeds, 50-year old Eva Beaver discovers a soup stain on the arm of the chair she painstakingly upholstered herself. This is the final straw, and she takes herself off to bed for a year, although she does not know this at the time.

Nagyon ritkán hagyok félbe könyvet, általában akkor sem "direkt", hanem egy idő után elfogadom a tényt, hogy ha már X ideje nem nyúltam hozzá, valószínűleg már nem is fogok. A kényszerű itthonlét alatt eddig csak jó könyveket olvastam (a Harry Potter sorozat esztétikai értékéről lehet vitatkozni, de az nyilván más szinten volt nagy élmény). And then right at the end, we find out, in one paragraph, the one interesting and tragic thing that ever happened to her...and it's never commented on at all.

Too many purposefully "odd" characters who are introduced in the book with no real purpose, e.g. all the visitors, the neighbour with facial injuries. The book definitely seems like a book of two halves to me. Fortunately the fact that Townsend is a gifted and able satirist saved the first half of the book somewhat and, as an ever-curious reader, I quite enjoyed seeing where it would all pan out around the theme of escape. The second half, however, where Eva Beaver, a ‘beautiful’ (we are told) middle-aged woman has, by now, voluntarily retreated to the confines (and safety?) of her own bedroom for a few too many months, proved a bit too much for me and the dominance of crazy characters (estranged husband and his affair living in the shed, purely strange and devoted to scientific theory twin offspring, etc. etc.) seemed to kill any plotline and enjoyment for me personally. I hoped this book would be funny, but sadly, it isn't. A woman called Eva decides, for no good reason that I can see, or any reason at all, to stay in bed for a year. Somewhat improbably, she manages to get several people, including her husband, mother, and mother-in-law, all running around bringing her food and drink. Even more improbaby, a handsome handyman called Alexander takes an inexplicable fancy to her, and starts running aroun waiting on her too. And people start coming to her for advice (why?). Most of the characters in the book, including Eva herself, are very tiresome people.As the book went on, I became angry with the main character, because she was so totally unrealistic. The book was billed as being about a woman who'd had enough, and finally given up the struggle - and that idea interested me. What I got was a well off woman with two shitty kids and a berk of a husband, who really, I felt no one would ever have married. She was an honorary MA of Leicester University, and in 2008 she was made a Distinguished Honorary Fellow, the highest award the University can give. She was an Honorary Doctor of Letters at Loughborough University, and a Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature. Her other awards include the James Joyce Award of the Literary and Historical Society of University College Dublin, and the Frink Award at the Women of the Year Awards. In 2009 she was given the Honorary Freedom of Leicester.