Friday, December 4, 2015

The Last Days of Rabbit Hayes

The Last Days of Rabbit Hayes
Anna McPartlin

The Last Days of Rabbit Hayes

Genre: Fiction

Summary (from Goodreads): Mia 'Rabbit' Hayes is a fighter, and the heart of her adoring, chaotic family. The cancer that's slowly taken over her body may be resolute, but Rabbit is stubborn too - she will not acknowledge that her diagnosis has just rapidly plummeted, or share this news with her twelve-year-old daughter, Juliet. It would mean the beginning of saying goodbye, and neither is ready for that just yet.

As Rabbit's family rally round her, armed with black humour and relentless optimism, they can see she's fading away. Soon the truth is clutching at them all: that against every fierce hope and heartfelt instinct, they will have to let her go.

 
Review:  If it weren't for the overuse of vulgar language and the proliferation of Irish idioms (do all Irish people really say "me ma" every time they talk about their mother?) I would have given this book 5 stars.  But based on the language alone, I don't feel like I could recommend this book to absolutely everyone, like I like to do with  my very favorite books.

The story was so tragic that it made me cry at least seven different times, but it also had moments that made me laugh out loud.  Although the blurb seems to indicate that the story is entirely about family relationships, there is also a very unusual love story intertwined with the emotions and goings-on of the various members of the Hayes family.  While the dying-mother-leaving-young-daughter premise made it almost impossible to read, it was strangely almost impossible to put down. A beautiful and heart-wrenching book.

Rating: 4.5 stars

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