Surviving Cyril

Surviving Cyril

Brilliant storytelling with very real characters!

I was curious when I saw this on Netgalley but decided to give it a chance. I hadn't read anything by this author before and I thought this would be a good place to start.

I wasn't wrong. This is a well written story. It manages to be moving, deeply emotional, funny and yet heartbreaking all at the same time. It explores love, hope, compassion and grief.

When Robin loses her husband to the war in Afghanistan she faces an unfathomable grief but she starts to crawl her way through because she has to survive for her four year old son Seth. Robin is a survivor but being a young widow pushes her to the brink. She knows she will get through this but she misses Tavis, her husband, and she knows she now has to learn to live without him. Dealing with her own loss is hard enough but having to manage the way other people deal with her loss is not something she has the time or patience for. She wants to grieve but she doesn't want to have to deal with other people's well meaning platitudes or their own grief. She also doesn't want to deal with her mother's grief.

And the there are her husband's friends. They weren't really her friends and she can keep them at a suitable distance despite their attempts to get her to join their outings and church activities.

And then there is Cyril.

Cyril is Tavis's no-hoper friend and best buddy. Hugely overweight, utterly mannerless and with no sensitivity whatsoever Cyril is the last person on earth that she wants to spend time with. Unfortunately just like his dad, four year old Seth adores Cyril or 'cereal' as he calls him and so Robin can't edge Cyril out of their life as she would really like to, in fact to some extent she has come to depend on him.

And so she dutifully takes Seth to visit Cyril and Cyril gets to act as uncle and slowly, slowly through shared grief and hope she gets to know Cyril and to see him as a human being not just a friend of her husband.

But there is so much more to Cyril than meets the eye and when Robins's life takes a sudden unexpected turn, Robin realises that Cyril is someone who is there for her without smothering her, someone she can depend on without losing the strong independent part of who she really is and she can weep, laugh, rage or be silent and Cyril is able to give her the space to do all those things. Having said this he is still the objectionable person he always was, until Robin finds out that her husband's death may not have been an accident and somehow Cyril has information about what really happened in Afghanistan.

Robin then has to face, not just the challenges of grief and loss but also the pressures of being in the middle of a media whirlwind, coping with both tragedy and with an unexpected life changing event.

This is such a wonderful story. The emotions just flow from the page and although the story starts from a sad place it is a story of hope. It is also a story about life, family and friendship and being able to make a way through life's devastations. And it is just gripping because Cyril is a pure anti-hero. He isn't a likeable character at all and that's what makes him so interesting. No six pack romantic here, just a foul mouth, overweight, slovenly computer nerd who grieves for his best friend in his own way and reluctantly becomes family for a widow and a small child.

I really liked the grittiness of the story telling and the rich characterisation. There were times I disliked Robin and thought she was an ingrate. I thought her mum was a bit smothering and her friends were not just that close. I quite liked Cyril and the way in which he tried to get the justice his dead friend had been seeking. He might have been overweight but his heart was in the right place. I also really liked the cameo appearance from characters who are in another novel by this author and I adored Seth. I think this kind of beautiful characterisation really brings a story to life and when the characters are held together by an interesting story that's all you really need as a reader.

The ending is left open for us to reflect on but the author has included some discussion questions at the end of the book. I think this would be a great story for a buddy read because I was left with so many questions and I was left with a deep admiration for Cyril.

I finished up and felt as if I had just finished a really good meal and of course by reading this book I had done.

I adored this story. I took a chance on it when I saw it on Netgalley and before I had finished this I went to buy the other book that the author has written. From now on everything she writes will go to the top of my humongous to read pile because this story gripped me and held my attention from start to finish.

At the end of the story I gave a huge sigh of satisfaction knowing that I will never forget this story and it is going on my list of exquisite reads of 2017.

I do hope we will get glimpses of Cyril in future books, just in the same way we have glimpses of Cooke in this one.

Copy provided by Netgalley in exchange for an unbiased review.