Book Review #44: Finding Audrey by Sophie Kinsella

Hey Guys x

So welcome to another review!

This time, as you can see, I'm reviewing a book by my absolute favourite author Sophie Kinsella!

This book is about a girl called Audrey. She has severe social and generalised anxiety, as well as episodes of depression. Because of this, Audrey doesn't leave the house, she wears dark glasses to avoid eye contact, and she doesn't speak to anyone that's not immediate family or her therapist. However, one day, Audrey meets Linus - and to her, he's the only person outside her family that gets it. And as he coaxes Audrey out of her own head, she finds that sometimes it takes someone else to find what's been inside of you all along.

I loved this book! I'm really glad that I waited until now to read it, when I know that I do have social anxiety myself, and so could relate to Audrey a lot more.
I think the topic of the book was handled really well. Like, we're completely in Audrey's head and can understand why things that seem somewhat normal to us are really hard for her. We can appreciate where Audrey is coming from, and we're proud of her when she makes steps, like going out, that we didn't think she'd ever be able to do.

I also fell in love with Linus. Honestly, I really need my own Linus, because he's the sweetest, greatest person. He doesn't really understand her condition at first, but he tries. He talks to her and writes her notes and makes himself understand how she feels, and I wish someone would do that for me! Honestly, he's a character that isn't a big romantic hero, like Augustus Waters. Instead, he's a friend. He's a really good friend, the kind of friend that everyone should have, or be, and I love this!

I also loved the fact that, because of Audrey's condition, there are only a limited number of characters. We only really get to know Audrey, Linus and the rest of Audrey's family, which makes the book really easy to comprehend and understand. And in addition, the way it's written also makes it an easy read, and it's really quick too!

What was good?
Aside from everything else I said, I really liked (and hated) the character of the mum. She begins the book by threatening to throw her son Frank's laptop out of the window, and I thought 'wow, she is intense!', and I wasn't wrong. She's incredible intense and annoying and I would hate for her to be my mum. But at the same time, I love her! I love how passionate she is about her kids, and how much she looks out for them and clearly loves them. She's a great character.
I also love the way that Sophie Kinsella handles Audrey's conditions. They weren't over-dramatized or anything, and it was completely relatable. It also helped me to think about my own anxiety, to compare mine to hers to see that mine definitely isn't as bad as I think it is, which was really nice and refreshing.

What was bad?
The main thing I didn't like was that, there was an incident that was mentioned a lot throughout the book, but there was never an explanation for what happened. I guess this made Audrey's character more realistic and everything, but it made it so much harder to dislike the characters that we were supposed to dislike. If we knew what they did, I feel like it would have been easier to understand why Audrey and her family (and Linus) acted the way they did.

Overall
I would definitely recommend this book to everyone! Audrey's 14 so it's definitely suitable for younger readers too! It casts a new light on mental health conditions that I think is really important. It's also just a genuinely great book - so definitely check it out!

Thank you for reading!

Will you be reading this book? Let me know in the comments!

Keep Smiling - Lou xx