This Shining Life: A moving, powerful novel about love, loss and treasuring life

· Random House
4.5
2 reviews
Ebook
320
Pages
Eligible
Ratings and reviews aren’t verified  Learn More

About this ebook

A captivating, emotional novel that weaves together an achingly beautiful picture of love in all its forms.

'An exquisitely beautiful and compelling novel about love, loss and life' Rachel Joyce
________________________

For Rich, life is golden.
He fizzes with happiness and love.

When Rich dies, he leaves behind a family without a father, a husband, a son and a best friend.

His wife, Ruth, can't imagine living without him and finds herself faced with a grief she's not sure she can find her way through. At the same time, their young son Ollie becomes intent on working out the meaning of life. Because everything happens for a reason. Doesn't it?

But when they discover a mismatched collection of presents left by Rich for his loved ones, it provides a puzzle for them to solve, one that will help Ruth navigate her sorrow and help Ollie come to terms with what's happened.

Together, they will learn to lay the ghosts of the past to rest, and treasure the true gift that Rich has left them: the ability to embrace life and love every moment.

Readers have been moved by THIS SHINING LIFE:
***** 'Compelling, bittersweet and beautifully written.'
***** 'This book will make you weep and laugh. It is so raw and real that I could feel what the characters are going through.'
***** 'Beautifully observed, compellingly written. I found it incredibly moving and I couldn't put it down.'
***** 'Harriet Kline conveys beautifully the whole range of emotions experienced by different people.'
***** 'I love this book from start to finish.'

'This captivated me...This beautiful book shows us that grief is not a problem to solve, but an expression of love, as we watch a family come together in the most heartwarming way.' Ann Napolitano, New York Times bestselling author of Dear Edward

'This Shining Life gives us a heartbroken family, complicated and familiar in the best ways, going through the hardest of times but finding love and hope and, especially, one another.' Laurie Frankel, author of This is How It Always Is, the Reese Witherspoon Book Club pick

Ratings and reviews

4.5
2 reviews
Marianne Vincent
June 3, 2021
“Can I do that puzzle, Dad, the one that tells you what it means to be alive?” This Shining Life is the first novel by British author, Harriet Kline. When nearly-eleven-year-old Ollie’s father dies, dealing with the avalanche of grief that surrounds him is a challenge. Rich was a cheese-loving, party-throwing joyous individual, loved by almost all who encountered him. Dad was the person who quizzed him on football teams and national capitals, helping to distract him from things that caused a meltdown. Ollie is different. He might be described as neuro-diverse, but his mum, Carrie simply says “It’s just how his brain’s wired. If he can’t see the world as we do, then we have to honour that.” Ollie loves things to be neat and correct. “I love puzzles. Killer sudoku are my favourite but I like word ladders and codewords too. They make me happy, but only when they’re finished. If they go wrong or I have to rub something out and the page gets creased, I get itchy under my fingernails” And “When there’s a thread in my sock, wriggling against my skin, I’m supposed to act as though it isn’t there. But it makes my feet feel blurry if the threads move around. I can only ignore it if I do a sudoku. Then I get told off for being rude because I’m ignoring everything else.” Also “I hate it when people ask me two questions at once because I don’t know which one to answer first.” Given a poor prognosis, Rich concentrates on enjoying the life he has remaining, being with those he loves. “He started telling me then that being alive was like a puzzle and it was all falling into place” When he makes a list of gifts he plans to give them, Ollie concludes “each present gives a clue about being alive.” So when Rich dies, this is the puzzle that Ollie fixates on: he will understand what it means to be alive. Of course, that doesn’t quite go to plan. Ollie is a smart boy: “Rich realized, as he watched him, that he was gathering information. He might have no instinct for being with people and he took scarce pleasure in their company, but it was obvious that he was making an effort to understand. He was storing up his observations and somehow, in the future, he would put them to use.” But Ollie is too young and perhaps too literal, to understand the reactions of those beloved. Carrie’s grief as a widow overlays her ongoing depression; her sister, Nessa is well-intentioned but lacks sensitivity to what others really need; their mother Angran, still determined to triumph over her abandonment by the father of her two small daughters, has no idea of how to mother, to show affection. Rich’s father, Gerald plagued by tinnitus and encroaching dementia, holds fast to the importance of rules and manners at the expense of accepting difference; his wife, Marjorie initially seems focussed on appearances. Kline paints the many faces of grief with skill and feeling. Her characters are appealing for all their very human flaws, and Ollie is likely to find a spot in the hearts of many readers. And while a happy ending with this plot is difficult, a hopeful one can be, and is, achieved. A beautifully written, moving debut novel. This unbiased review is from an uncorrected proof copy provided by NetGalley and Transworld Publishers.
Did you find this helpful?

About the author

Harriet Kline works part time registering births, deaths and marriages and writes for the rest of the week. Her story Ghost won the Hissac Short Story Competition and Chest of Drawers won The London Magazine Short Story Competition.

Other short stories have been published online with Litro, For Books' Sake, and ShortStorySunday, and on BBC Radio 4. She lives in Bristol with her partner and two teenage sons.

Rate this ebook

Tell us what you think.

Reading information

Smartphones and tablets
Install the Google Play Books app for Android and iPad/iPhone. It syncs automatically with your account and allows you to read online or offline wherever you are.
Laptops and computers
You can listen to audiobooks purchased on Google Play using your computer's web browser.
eReaders and other devices
To read on e-ink devices like Kobo eReaders, you'll need to download a file and transfer it to your device. Follow the detailed Help Center instructions to transfer the files to supported eReaders.