Review: Emotional story!
Rating: 4 out of 5
Date: 02 26, 2014
Finding Lily by Lisa D. Ellis is a very emotional story that is very likely to break your heart and yet ultimately offer hope.  Claire and her husband Jim had anxiously awaited the birth of their first child Lily and are devastated when they lose her shortly after she is born.  Everywhere Claire turns there are reminders of her baby girl and she outwardly grieves.  She cries and is unmotivated to do anything at all.  In contrast her husband Jim throws himself into his work and tries to move on.  Needless to say this infuriates Claire who feels if he can’t outwardly grieve their daughter, then he must not have loved her.  Not knowing what else to do Claire escapes to a live for a while in a lighthouse that she had visited and loved as a child.When Claire arrives she revels in the solitude thinking it exactly what she needed.  There are no reminders of Lily here.  The time there will give her the space she needs to sort through her grief and her feelings on her marriage.  As the weeks go by Claire feels certain she can feel her daughter’s presence there with her and it comforts her.  When she discovers some old love letters of the woman who lives there year round they cause her to reflect on her own marital problems.  Yet she also remembers meeting her husband on this very island and falling in love with him.  Does the loss of their child also mean the loss of their marriage?  Claire just doesn’t know.Finding Lily isn’t the easiest book to read at times.  I can’t imagine losing a child as I barely survived losing my dog.  I did relate to this book in a lot of ways because many, many years ago one of my best friends lost her first baby as he was stillborn.  I was there for his birth and later witnessed much of the same emotions that Claire experiences and it was heartbreaking.I think one of the biggest things to note is not everyone deals with grief the same way in a marriage and this novel portrays that perfectly.  While Claire wears her emotions on her sleeve, Jim does not and neither way is wrong but it’s easy to see how it can cause conflict in a marriage.  The person literally falling apart simply cannot understand how their partner can go on and live each day as they did before.  I’m one of those falling apart people so again I identified with Claire.  Ultimately I think Finding Lily is a novel of hope and healing.  It’s weird to say I enjoyed a book that broke my heart but I did.  I would say that this would make a fantastic book club pick as there is a lot to discuss from losing a child to the effects it has on a marriage.  Finding Lily is well worth reading but have a box of tissues nearby.