Book Review || Oh Dear Silvia.

'Oh Dear Silva' is the latest novel from the fantastic, Dawn French. Its a novel about a woman, Silva who has fallen of a balcony... did she fall? Did she get pushed?... we soon find out later on in the novel. The main focus of the novel is that Silva doesn't speak as she's in a coma. We find out about Silva and her life by her friends and family members coming to visit her. In monologues. Each chapter is a character and their monologue and piece by piece we have a full image of Silvia.

I have been waiting to read this book for ages when I found out that this was being published. I haven't read Dawn French's first novel, 'A Tiny Bit Marvellous' or her autobiography, 'Dear Fatty' but I am aware of what Dawn does and I really admire her. We mostly know Dawn as the great comedian, French and Saunders, The Vicar of Dibley... Dawn has been in pretty much everything and she is amazing. Before this book was published, Dawn did numerous interviews but I watched her interview on The One Show and she seemed very enthusiastic about the book and I think that's when I really thought that I should buy this book. I then went on Youtube and searched for more interviews, so I watched Dawn on Loose Women talking about the book and the next day or two, I bought the book. The book cost me about £8-£9 in Asdas. Which I thought wasn't really that expensive. I was just happy that I finally had the book. 

The book contains 352 pages, which quite frankly, isn't enough! This book is just so brilliant, it is just one of those books where you can sit down, relax and just have a quick read of the chapter/novel. Some chapters I thought went on for a bit too long but I was too hooked into the story and I wanted to know more about Silvia. 

The main thing that I love about Dawn's writing is the characterization of the the characters in the novel. All of the characters are so different from each other and are just brilliantly written. My favourite character has to be the Jamaican nurse, Winnie. She is just a joy to read about, you can visualise the character in your mind with that brilliant accent. An interesting thing about the book is that Dawn doesn't just use the characters to build an image of Silva, she writes about the character's personal lives too which gives the characters much more depth and more of a purpose in the novel. There are really strange, unique characters in the novel too. Especially Jo. Jo is Silvia's sister and she's the character that really made me laugh out loud to myself. The chapter with the stripper is one of my favourites as you can just visualise the situation and you can actually visualise how bonkers she really is. The characters are just so human alike I feel, as I, myself can relate to each character, which I find is always a good thing whilst reading books. 

I think overall the plot is a really strong and bold story and it was written beautifully and I can't imagine how hard it must of been for Dawn to write the book due to the loss of her mother. When I was watching the Loose Women interview with Dawn, she said; "I was with my mum one day... and she just woke up (out of a coma), and she just looked at me and said 'What are you doing? Why aren't you writing?' I said to her... 'Mum... I'm here with you.. I want to look after you...', and then she just looked at me and said, 'But this is your research, this is exactly what your book is about...'". I think that is accurate, well close to anyway... I really enjoyed this book and I hope to read Dawn's autobiography and her first novel very soon. Plus, I hope Dawn has a very long and a lasting career in writing as she captures humanity and society in perfect words and dialogue. 

I give this book 4 stars. 

4.0 out of 5 sta

Thank you for reading.