Isabel Moore has been having a rough year. Her husband, Chris has moved out, her daughter is becoming a moody teenager and her wild and crazy best friend, Josie, died in a car accident. Isabel is struggling through her grief and feels her life is slowly coming apart at the seams. Isabel is an elementary school teacher who has had several miscarriages that has affected her marriage and her single mother is trying to get Isabel to start dating.
I love Isabel. She is a great character and I could easily relate to her. In fact it felt like we would be fast friends if only, she were real. She is a forty something woman who is struggling with the big events of her life and she is trying to figure how best to handle them. Sometimes, she screams and yells, sometimes, she says the wrong thing, sometimes, she cries and sometimes, she just eats cake.
Lauren Fox is an excellent, smart writer who takes the ordinary events of our lives, parenthood, marriage, grief, love, and aging and spins a tale that is contemplative yet electric. You will laugh and you will be emotional. Fox has some pretty, witty one-liners in Days of Awe. Fox shows readers that when all you want to do is cry from grief, one of the best things you can do is to laugh.
The title, Days of Awe refers to the days before Yom Kippur, Day of Atonement, the holiest day of the year for Jewish people. I think the title has double meaning as it also refers to the days of our lives when we are in awe of the world or in awe of our children, or in awe of life.
I am in awe of Lauren Fox and can't wait to read all of her books.
