This is the third book following the life of Matilda Windsor. Set during Covid, Mattie is in her care home with the nurses and aids that keep them safe and taken care of. As she approaches her 100th birthday, her "family" at the home are trying to help her celebrate in the style she wants. I think I would have enjoyed this book more if I had read the previous two books.

I found this hard to get into at first, you are thrown into the story. It was hard to follow. But I stuck with it and it did get somewhat better. You are thrown into the story of Matty, who is in a nursing home and is about to turn 100. There is a lot in her past, and she has woven a story of what her life is that may or may not be accurate. It is also covid, which adds another twist. She refers to the nursing aid as her maid, and doesn’t understand what happens when the undocumented woman goes missing. There are lots of secrets, including a baby given up many years before. #lyricsforthelovedones #annegoodwin #bookstagram #booknerd #lovetoread #readallday #bookloversofinstagram #readersofinstagram

This curious book set during the pandemic follows the intertwined stories of several characters including Matty, who’s about to turn 100, and lives in a care home. One of Marty’s carers helps her make 100
You tube videos for her hundredth birthday to raise money for the Red Cross, with unexpected results. The book’s unique element is that it was written in Lancashire dialect in parts, with a glossary of terms at the end. The Lancashire dialect made it harder to read in the beginning, but it was worth the effort. Many of the characters have had difficult lives and mental health challenges which are sympathetically explored. The book is set during a grim period of our history and relates sad stories, but is ultimately life affirming and optimistic.

I didn't read any of the other 2 parts of this series, so maybe that contributed to my inability to feel like I had any clue what was going on. Also, it was very dialect-focused language and I just didn't have the energy or interest to try and decipher it. I didn't finish the book , and that is very rare for me. I received an ARC from #NetGalley and appreciate the opportunity to try this story.

I like this author's writing style. There are funny and not so funny moments here. The story has decent pacing and I stayed mostly engaged.

I really appreciate the free copy for review!!

“Try to be the rainbow that colours your neighbours cloud”
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Whilst this book would work okay as a stand alone story, it might be a little more satisfying to put events into perspective and get to know who’s who, having read the previous two episodes: Stolen Summers and Matilda Windsor Is Coming Home. Lyrics For The Loved Ones, brings closure to Matilda Windsor’s long, yet almost totally institutionalised life, in an emotionally charged yet wonderfully poignant way, although some of the wider societal issues raised within its pages deliberately remain unresolved, accurately reflecting the current position today, some three years later, when Covid is behind us, but with the aftermath set to remain highly visible, prevalent and I suspect, unresolved, for many years to come.

You might need to be aware that there are multiple trigger points for any particularly emotionally vulnerable readers, although personally I didn’t find them too troubling, as they are all part of the rich tapestry of life as we know it today and none of them took over the story in any discernible way.

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In Cumbria, Matilda Windsor has spent her entire adult life in institutions, whether that be a mental health care facility, or care home for the elderly. In her middle years, half-hearted attempts to re-introduce her back into society, ended in distressing failure for all concerned. So now in 2019, as she approaches her one hundredth birthday, the end of her days continue to be mapped out for her by others, including the deadly Coronavirus Pandemic.

For the entire length of her isolation from the outside world, at the original instigation of a tyrannical father, (whom it transpires, had little room to espouse his pious words and actions) for no other reason than that she gave birth out of wedlock, Matilda’s new notion of reality has been shaped by imaginary conversations she has with her long departed mother, the firm belief that her carers are in fact the family maids and servants, (although her favourite, Oh My Darling (Clementine), has suddenly gone missing) and an unshakeable confidence that she once was an eminent stage performer, simply resting and awaiting her next big break.

Even as plans are being set in motion for Matilda’s big birthday extravaganza, the deadly new Coronavirus Pandemic takes its grip on the world and lockdown strikes, rendering any further organising useless. It transpires that the manager of the care home and two other members of staff are closely related, and that between them they have been busy purloining funds which the residents and their families have left in security for ongoing day-to-day personal needs, for other nefarious ‘expenses’, including PPE equipment when the official budgets dried up. One of the ‘caring’ family, decides that Matty, who had been determined to perform on a theatre stage for her party, should purchase a tablet and set up a fundraising page, by reciting poetry and skits online. This obviously attracts nationwide, if not worldwide, audiences and as a result, not only does the cash come pouring in, but down in Bristol, octogenarian Gloria, who was adopted from birth, is convinced that Matilda might be her long-lost mother. Unfortunately for Gloria, another of the ‘caring’ family and one of Matty’s favourite maids, Irene, who looked after Matty’s unmarried brother Henry until his death, has already decided that as her own birthday treat for Matty, she will reunite her with her long-lost daughter, although with nothing to help her in tracing the illusive personage, she has, with apparently no malintent, enlisted the help of another of her relatives, who conveniently lives in Spain out of physical reach, is of roughly the correct age and is willing to go along with Irene’s ruse.

Gloria did not have a particularly happy childhood and has spent her entire life assuming that her mother did not want her and had willingly given her up for adoption. The church has played a big part in her later life, with her becoming a stalwart member of the choir, although what she really sees as her one major triumph of success, is her son Timothy, who works in child psychiatric care. He has just accepted a marriage proposal from his long-term partner Brendan, a school librarian. However, life has a cruel way of throwing curved balls into the game, so Tim’s untimely medical diagnosis, together with the onset of lockdown, scuppers their wedding plans. Tim breathes a sigh of relief that, in compulsory isolation, he can at least hide his illness from his mother, but the subterfuge doesn’t sit well with Brendan, especially when he sees how Gloria struggles mentally with being confined to the house, so he engineers a situation which means that Tim has to come clean with her. Gloria is remarkably calm about the prognosis, even down to agreeing with her two favourite sons that they should en masse, break lockdown regulations and travel all the way up to Cumbria to meet Matty, before it is too late.

Despite the odds, Matty beats a bout of Covid, celebrates her birthday and gets to be, however briefly, reunited with the daughter she had never been allowed to meet all those decades ago, totally forgetting how she had been duped by the well-meaning Irene. At last she has become one of the Loved Ones. She has family.

And that’s a wrap folks, not a dry eye in the house!

...


Okay! So let’s get those potential trigger points out in the open before we go any further –

With a strong background in clinical psychology, author Anne Goodwin unashamedly, yet sympathetically, empathetically and compassionately, raises for discussion some of those often complex and difficult to deal with societal mores, which surround us in our daily lives and can result in such traumatising long-term outcomes, both physical and mental, for both the sufferers and their loved ones. Forced adoption. Psychiatric institutionalised care. The shame of a nation with the cover-up of ‘Windrush’. Black Lives Matter. Same sex marriage. The unfiltered reality of a cancer diagnosis and the impact of the Covid Pandemic on treatment and recovery. The unscrupulous behaviour of some residential care home staff, no matter how well-meaning their actions might be. The detrimental mental and physical health affects on a population under lockdown regulations. Death (often premature) and the agonising inability of family to feel solace and closure during the Covid days.

Through some wonderfully articulate, engaging and richly crafted narrative, no single one of those threads ever threatened to overwhelm this well constructed, multi-layered storyline. Hence, despite being certain that I didn’t want to read any of the inevitable ‘Covid Days’ books, what I had anticipated might be a rather intense and slightly morbid trek through 2019/2020, was actually transformed into an evocative and uplifting journey, with some periods of genuinely poignant, levity and mirth, especially when Irene decides to break the lockdown regulations in her own inimitable style and Gloria decides that a lockdown spring-clean is the way to go before she breaks all the rules!

Short chapters ensured that the transitions between the Cumbria and Bristol locations, were smooth and easy to follow, with the two separate storylines running their individual course before converging seamlessly to a satisfying closure for everyone concerned, particularly Matilda and Grace. Even though it would have by now been unlikely that Matilda would have fully comprehended all the nuances and injustices of a situation which had dominated most of her life and need never have happened, suffice that she might have finally been vindicated in her assertions all those decades ago, that she was not insane, simply heartbroken.

I approached this series with some trepidation and not a small amount of angst. However, I found myself becoming lost in a world where the characters took over from the very first page, to the final word, with me very much on the outside, looking in and eavesdropping on their lives. The atmosphere they created through their interactions and conversational, free-flowing dialogue, really lifted them off the page, made them three dimensional and brought them to life.

At first, I was a little unsure as to Anne’s thinking when she decided to single out Irene to speak in a broad Cumbrian dialect. However, it worked to perfection and definitely made her character stand out from the crowd, especially during lockdown, when she breaks the rules in a most ingenious way, which to many might seem rather strange. However, those occasions really define the essence of the story, as they highlight all too clearly Matilda’s torrid past and her relationship with her father, in a unique and totally absorbing style, whilst also offering some much needed light-hearted moments, when Irene is very lucky she is on her own and playing to a passive audience. Those moments also afforded Irene the opportunity to purge her own innermost thoughts, when many tears were shed, as it was only then that it became clear that her silence and bravado were only covering up her own inner turmoil about events which had hitherto, never been brought out into the open.

Location was never a strong factor in this final episode of the series, as I suspect it was never intended to be. Lyrics for The Loved Ones is definitely all about the story and its characters. Matty is by now, far to infirm to either leave the care home, or venture far from its doors. Similarly, Gloria and her family, are firmly entrenched in their own lives down in Bristol. For everyone, although spirits may have been lifted by the experience and the ‘knowing’, this all seems just a bit too little, a lot too late.

What typically makes reading such a wonderful experience for me, is that with each and every book, I am taken on a unique and individual journey, by some amazing authors who fire my imagination, stimulate my senses and stir my emotions. For a whole raft of personal reasons, I didn’t expect to become as lost in the pages as I did, so thank you for some truly memorable moments to treasure, Anne.

This book is a sequel to Matilda Windsor is Coming Home. It is a fantastic book which I can't recommend highly enough. Although Lyrics for the Loved Ones works perfectly well as a standalone novel you will enjoy it all the more if you familiarise yourself with the main character, Matty, before doing so.

Lyrics for the Loved Ones provided me with the wonderful opportunity to spend more time in Matty's company. She is a wonderful character, who has been misunderstood all of her life, been incarcerated in a mental institution for having a baby out of wedlock and we now find her living in Cumbria in a care home. I have read many, many books over the years and Matty remains one of my favourite characters.

This particular book is set during the covid pandemic and it follows Matty and those connected with her. It is written with poignancy as well as moments of humour amidst such challenging circumstances.