#Review ~ Something Like Happy By Eva Woods ~ @inkstainsclaire

Something Like Happy

By Eva Woods

Review:
Something Like Happy is one of those books that grabs your attention and then takes you on an emotional roller coaster ride. Grab your box of Kleenex and settle in for a wonderful read. 

Annie has suffered horrible tragedies and she is just not able to pull herself back together to see the bright side of life. She is in a bad place emotionally. This poor lady is depressed and alone. She doesn't have any friends to support her. That is until she runs into a lady in the hospital that is beaming with happiness and only sees the sunshine in life. Polly and Annie see the world in two completely different lights.

Polly has received a horrible diagnosis. She has Cancer and only has a few months left to live. I have to say I admired Polly's courage. She such a sweet lady and has so much left that she wants to do. She decides to set out with a happy attitude and make every day special. She wants to do something fun each day for 100 days and she wants someone to help her do it. She chooses Annie to help her and shows up to ask for her help. Annie is hesitant at first. 

This is really quite a story. It hit on all the emotions. There is laughter and joy, tears and sadness. Then there is the deep friendship bond that forms quickly between Polly and Annie. This is a really good case of opposites attract. These two ladies that may have never met if it was not for illnesses become the best of friends in a short amount of time. 

This was a very emotional read for me having lost my husband a little over a year ago to Cancer. I know what it can do to the patient and the family. The toll is can take on them physically, mentally, and emotionally. Eva Woods has done such a great job with this book. If you enjoy a Women's Fiction book that is going to touch your heart then you need to grab this book. You better grab the Kleenex box too because you are going to need it a few times. 

Eva Woods has a great talent for telling a story packed full of emotions. She has created characters that easily become new friends to me as I read. She has added in family drama, relationship issues, tension between friends, illnesses and how they effect the patient and the family. She has done a wonderful job with telling this story that I think several people will easily relate to.

I was given the opportunity to read this incredible story and it has been my pleasure to share my thoughts with you.

Amazon Buy Link

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Blurb:

Inspired by the wildly popular #100HappyDays social media challenge, SOMETHING LIKE HAPPY is an emotional and profoundly moving new novel that asks the question: What would you do if you only had 100 days to live? What would you do if you had nothing left to lose? 

Annie is sleepwalking through life. After a series of tragedies upend her marriage and destroy the perfect life she had built for herself, Annie doesn’t believe her heart can be broken any further. Now she’s a 30something living in a run-down apartment with a roommate, working a boring 9-to-5 job, and looking after her hospital-ridden mother. She’s lost touch with her friends and isn’t interested in finding new people to care about. But Annie is okay with that and has resigned herself to a life of solitary binge-watching—after all, if you’ve already lost everything, you don’t have anything left to lose, right?  


But when she meets Polly—an impossibly cheerful and optimistic cancer patient—Annie’s worldview is turned on its head. From her colorful outfits to her bottomless generosity, Polly’s enthusiasm and zest for life could not be more at odds with Annie’s jaded cynicism. Because if terminal illness has taught Polly anything, it’s that in order to discover a rainbow, sometimes you have to put up with the rain. She also knows that time is short. Too short to waste a single day, which is precisely why she wants Annie to join her on a mission…to celebrate life, while she still has the chance. 

Together these two unlikely friends embark on the “100 Happy Days” challenge, with a goal of doing one happy thing each day for 100 days. The tasks are relatively simple: Smile at strangers. Give someone flowers. Be honest. Be silly. Let go. And while Annie is initially skeptical, she soon finds that days spent riding rollercoasters and dancing in fountains with Polly begin to mend her broken heart—even as the progression of Polly’s illness threatens to shatter it all over again. 


SOMETHING LIKE HAPPY contemplates what it means to be happy and challenges readers to embrace life in all its messiness—the ups and the downs, the love and the loss, the joys and the devastations. Because as Annie will discover, happiness—or something like it—is always possible. 

On Sale: September 2017
$26.99 U.S. / $29.99 CAN. 
Hardcover ISBN-13: 9781525811357 

Amazon Buy Link

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ABOUT EVA WOODS:
Eva Woods was inspired to write SOMETHING LIKE HAPPY after surviving her own brush with cancer and the breakdown of her marriage. Raised in a small village in Northern Ireland, Woods now lives in London, where she teaches creative writing and regularly contributes to Marie Claire UK, xoJane, and other publications. She writes crime fiction as Claire McGowan. 

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