Review: The Language of Dying

The Language of Dying by Sarah Pinborough
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

This is a hard book to read on many different levels.

The title alone shows you the main theme of the book and so going in I knew it wasn't going to be a laugh a minute thrill. What I wasn't prepared for was how much it would actually hit me.

Sarah Pinborough is an author whose writing I have loved for a long time and I have had the pleasure to hear her speak. She never pulls her punches and always surprises me with her books. The Language of Dying was no different for me.

The central character (whose name you never know) is telling us the story of the last week of her father's life and how her dysfunctional family comes together over it, and then instantly splits again. Moments of this were incredibly beautiful and touching, and I wanted to remind myself that I was seeing these characters through just one person's eyes. Only one side of the story was being told. Penny, bright and beautiful, had a life beyond what we see and has so many good qualities to her that I found it important to remember them.

The ways it's told can be frustrating upon occasion, but I do believe that only revealed more of how they must be feeling. I wanted to know more and delve even deeper into their world, but you're just left with this snapshot that is hard to shake.

Finally, I found it significant that the people's names that you never learn are the protagonist and her father. I feel like this was a clever way to link them and to show how their paths were tied together.

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