Oh William! by Elizabeth Strout

4.5 ★★★★

Written by Elizabeth Strout, this contemporary novel spins the story of widow Lucy Barton as she is pulled back into the world of her ex-husband William. The book explores her relationship with William and the relationship she had with William's mother, Catherine. After being gifted an ancestry test by their daughter, things become very surprising when William discovers that he has a long-lost sister. William, shaken by the news, insists that Lucy comes with him to meet her.

The book is very much about William, from its title and character. Lucy focuses on William completely. You learn more about his life and her life with him than her life with her husband David, who passed away before the beginning of the book. We not only learn about William's relationship with Lucy, which ended in divorce due to a lot of infidelity on William's part, but we also learn about the other wives William had after Lucy. We meet William during his third marriage, which through the course of the book, has its own challenges.

Most importantly, we get an insight into the life of William's mother, who passed away, leaving a huge secret that William has to come to terms with. As for our main character Lucy throughout the book, you get the sense that she is grateful for her time with William. She is looking back on her life with her first love and seeing how she has changed since she first met, married, and had a life with him. It's a reflection on how Lucy has grown as a person, and at the time the reader meets her, she's perfectly happy within herself, while William, three marriages down, continues to make the same mistakes, and it isn't until his life is turned upside down that the person he is begins to break.

However, what is important to note is Lucy never gloats or holds anything above William, despite him giving her a lot of reasons to. Instead, she looks at him with thankfulness and an ire of sympathy that only someone who is grateful can. Ultimately, ‘Oh William!’ is a story of the joy of lives lived, reflection, and how our choices define us.

In a light but impactful novel, author Elizabeth Strout creates a world that is gripping and interesting. Her writing has a quick-witted and easy nature, and it is easy to get stuck into the pages of this book, only to find that you have made it halfway through without noticing.  ‘Oh, William!’ is part of the Amgash series, a series of 4 books that follows the character of Lucy Barton throughout her life. This book can be read as a standalone. ‘Oh, William!’ is a longlist contender for the Booker Prize 2022. You can find ‘Oh, William!’ and its sibling books through your local independent bookstore.

_

Freelance writer with a love of books, particularly those from the 70s and 80s, and in the horror genre, she also has a fondness for classical literature and isn't opposed to digging in with the odd women's fiction. She lives in Shropshire, England with her husband, several furry guinea pups, and Duke the Fish. In order to stop annoying her husband with her constant conversation about the books she reads, she created Step Into The Void, a blog named after the mental state her other half says he steps into whenever she starts talking about the latest Jay Kristoff vampire novel or decides to try to explain the entire plot to Jenn Lyon's four-book epic The Chorus of Dragons or tries to explain why the horror fiction genre is slowing coming back thanks to authors like Grady Hendrix, Augustina Bazterrica, and Catriona Ward.  

Check out her Instagram @booksinthevoid