The Brilliant Life of Eudora Honeysett by Annie Lyons

The Brilliant Life of Eudora Honeysett by Annie Lyons

372 pages

Published September 2020 by William Morrow

Publisher's Summary: 

It's never too late to start living.

Eudora Honeysett is done with this noisy, moronic world--all of it. She has witnessed the indignities and suffering of old age and has lived a full life. At eighty-five, she isn't going to leave things to chance. Her end will be on her terms. With one call to a clinic in Switzerland, a plan is set in motion.

Then she meets ten-year-old Rose Trewidney, a whirling, pint-sized rainbow of sparkling cheer. All Eudora wants is to be left alone to set her affairs in order. Instead, she finds herself embarking on a series of adventures with the irrepressible Rose and their affable neighbor, the recently widowed Stanley--afternoon tea, shopping sprees, trips to the beach, birthday celebrations, pizza parties.

While the trio of unlikely BFFs grow closer and anxiously await the arrival of Rose's new baby sister, Eudora is reminded of her own childhood--of losing her father during World War II and the devastating impact it had on her entire family. In reflecting on her past, Eudora realizes she must come to terms with what lies ahead.

But now that her joy for life has been rekindled, how can she possibly say goodbye?

My Thoughts: 

When I saw I'm on a roll reading about older ladies with attitude, this is my latest example (following Three Days In June, The Little Village of Book Lovers, Remarkably Bright Creatures, and The Life Impossible). My sister recommended it to me but when I first picked it up, I was afraid it was too soon after my last book about a cranky old woman. But I needed to get books back to the library so I picked it up again and soon was drawn in to Eudora's story. 

Eudora is the reason the saying "You never know what someone is going through, so be kind." She has very little patience for people any longer and even less time for them. She's getting older and slower and has no family. She's ready for life to be done and she's desperate to go out on her own terms. There's a part of me that never stopped believing she was right to feel that way, especially when she expected to be all alone at the end. 

But Rose didn't see Eudora as an old woman whose time was about over. She understood that Eudora was old, but it never occurred to her that Eudora wouldn't be around for her as long as she needed her. I felt the same way about my mom so I could certainly understand how a ten-year-old would feel that way. Rose saw in Eudora someone who could be a friend and ally. But Eudora hadn't had a friend in a very long time, nor family or love in almost as long and she certainly wasn't looking for any of those things when Rose first showed up on her door. But Annie Lyons wants readers to understand that friends can be any age and family can be the people we choose to care about. 

Eudora had been hurt a lot in her life and disappointed by so many people. It was hard for her not to expect that from her new friends and even harder to believe that those people would be there for her until the end. So she never gave up on her desire to go to Switzerland and end her life on her own terms. And I came to believe that was exactly how this book would end, that having developed those friendships and that makeshift family, Eudora could do what she wanted to do without regret. 

The night before I finished this book, it had gotten late. I had only about ten pages left to read but I had to get to sleep. So I finished this one while I had my morning coffee. Big mistake. Those of you who have been around for a long time will know that while a lot of books have really impacted me emotionally, few have made me cry. This one did. It's the kind of ending that is both sad and uplifting. And now I have to read something completely different because I want to let this one sit with me for a while.