The Year of Taking Chances by Lucy Diamond: a review

Recently, I’ve been trying to make my way through my shelves, both digital and physical, and try to read all those books that have just sat there waiting to be read. With class books and work, I haven’t really had time to start making my way through my physical shelf yet, but I can use headphones while I’m at work, and that means I can listen to audiobooks. This listen was due to needing something light after Their Little Secret. After this, I decided to do what I wanted to start doing with my physical shelf; go through my shelf alphabetically, and listen to/read everything I haven’t read before. I will be doing this with my physical shelf soon, but class books to have to take precedent.

            The Year of Taking Chances by Lucy Diamond follows three women, Gemma, Caitlin, and Saffron, after a New Year’s party. There’s Gemma, a woman who seemingly has the perfect life; nice house, great husband, two loving kids, but one day causes cracks to start showing. Then, there’s Caitlin who has to pack up the house where she grew up, after the loss of her mother, and discovers more about her family dynamic than she’d planned. Finally, there’s Saffron, a PR executive to the “stars”. She’s got so much on her plate already, but now she has so much more than herself and work to worry about.

            Diamond makes such loveable characters, while keeping them real, and well-rounded, so they don’t ever feel saccharine sweet. Every character goes through a fair whack of hardship, and the way they hold their heads up high is so accurate. There’s no overly positive waking up one day and choosing to be happy. They have to work through their problems, and there are times, especially with Gemma and her husband, where that doesn’t always look so likely. All the positive moments feel earned, and the negatives are so heart-breaking. There were so many times where I wanted to reach though the story just to help them out. This is also very much a power of friendship story in the best possible way. Their problems are best solved when they are able to reach out and talk to somebody else and ask for help.

            In the best possible way, I was left wanting so much more when I reached the end of this novel. Hearing that “the end” left me feeling bereft. I want to keep being able to dive into these characters’ lives. I had such a wonderful time with this book, just as I did the last time I read one of Lucy Diamond’s books. She’s certainly an author I’ll look out for.

            I cannot recommend this book to you enough. It’s a five-star read if there ever was one, and the audiobook is expertly read too. No matter how you enjoy this book, I’d certainly say it’s worth getting your hands on.

            I’d usually leave it there, but I have a little something I want to start doing. I know my dear readers have always enjoyed making me suffer, and I wanted to give you the chance to help out with that endeavour. There are books out there with bad reputations, and I want to find out if they deserve it. If you want to help out with that, then I have a wish-list you can go to and pick a book for me to possibly suffer through:

https://www.amazon.co.uk/hz/wishlist/ls/33XX7MWZ3PD7A?ref_=wl_share