Blog Tour ~ The Coordinates of Loss by Amanda Prowse

✨Jaffareadstoo is thrilled to be hosting today's stop on The Coordinates of Loss Blog Tour ✨

Lake Union Publishing
25 September 2018

My thanks to the publishers and edpr for my copy of the book and for the invitation to be part of this blog tour

What's it all about...

When Rachel Croft wakes up on her family’s boat in Bermuda, it’s to sunshine and yet another perfect day…until she goes to wake her seven-year-old son, Oscar. Because the worst thing imaginable has happened. He isn’t there.

In the dark and desperate days that follow, Rachel struggles to navigate her grief. And while her husband, James, wants them to face the tragedy together, Rachel feels that the life they once shared is over. Convinced that their happy marriage is now a sham, and unable to remain in the place where she lost her son, she goes home to Bristol alone.

Only when she starts receiving letters from Cee-Cee, her housekeeper in Bermuda, does light begin to return to Rachel’s soul. She and James both want to learn to live again—but is it too late for them to find a way through together?...

Here's what I thought about it...

It is every parent’s worst nightmare to wake from sleep and find a beloved child gone from sight. When Rachel Croft discovers that her seven year old son is missing from his bed, her immediate reaction is to search all the nooks and crannies of the family’s boat, thinking that Oscar is hiding. However, the desperately sad opening chapter of the book reveals that all is not well. What then follows is visceral and all-consuming look at the absolute desperation which comes from tragedy, and shows, with real insight, into just how coping with such a desperately sad situation can either make or break a fragile spirit.

There’s a real sense of heartbreak throughout the whole of the story and the author has done a commendable job at creating, in vivid detail, a sense of bewilderment and the utter loneliness of trying and, in Rachel’s case, failing to rationalise such a devastating loss. I found the book immeasurably sad, and testament to the author’s sensitive handling of such a difficult topic, quite gripping, although, I have to say that there were times when I needed to take a break, as Rachel’s grief was filled with such raw emotion. I enjoyed the parts of the narrative which were centred on the family’s elderly housekeeper, Cee-Cee who, with beautiful and quite lyrical prose, explores her own feelings of loss. Cee-Cee’s strength of character and her uncanny ability to get through to Rachel when no-one else can comes across in a poignant narrative which is quite unique to Cee-Cee. 

The Coordinates of Loss is a real study into relationships, not just between a mother and her child but also between husband and wife and, I think it also shows the poignant reality of how the wider circle of friends and family cope, not just with their grief and sense of loss, but also in trying to bolster fragile moods and unpredictable behaviour.

I think for some readers this might be quite a difficult story as it focuses heavily on the after effects of grief but all credit to the author for tackling such a poignant subject and doing so in such a sensitive and profoundly moving way.

On my reading table

About the Author

Amanda Prowse is one of the UK's most prolific and loved story tellers with global sales of 6 million copies and legions of loyal fans. Based near Bristol, Amanda is the author of 25 novels and novellas, with books sold in 22 countries and translated into 12 languages -  no mean feat when you consider her first novel was only published in 2012.

Website

Twitter @MrsAmandaProwse #TheCoordinatesof Loss

@ed_pr