Show Me 5 Saturday – Your Roots Are Showing by Elise Chidley

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1 Title:  Your Roots Are Showing by Elise Chidley

2 Words that describe the book:   Lizzie’s changes

3 Settings or characters:

*  Lizzie Buckley, in the throes of postpartum depression, has little interest in her husband or life in general.

*  Tessa, Lizzie’s best friend since they were small, is her biggest supporter.  She won’t let Lizzie fall any deeper into the abyss of depression.  She gets her started on the process of climbing out.  Everyone needs a friend like Tessa.

*  Roger, Lizzie’s father-in-law.  Always her fan, he truly hopes she and his son can make things work.  He’s a bit of a character but he seemed genuinely in Lizzie’s corner.  I thought he was the one person who gave her hope.

4 Things I liked/disliked about the book:

*  I loved Elise Chidley’s way of telling the story so that it was easy to sympathize with almost every character.

*  The humor was laugh-out-loud at times.  That said, this is not a fluff book.  It addresses serious issues faced by many women at one time or another.  It was an emotional read but not a depressing one.

*  I liked how Chidley showed Lizzie’s experience of starting to run, starting therapy, dealing with her food issues, etc.  I could imagine myself feeling the same way as Lizzie.

*  I didn’t like that Lizzie and James seemed to give up too easily from the start (that’s not a spoiler).  I guess their feelings were so hurt they just turned inward.  Maybe that’s not so unusual.

5 Stars or less for the rating:   4.5/5 stars.  I recommend it.

Back of the book: Lizzie Buckley is having doubts about her picture-perfect world.  She does love her country estate, precocious three-year-old twins, and handsome husband, James.  But nobody warned her about postpartum depression and the toll it would take on her marriage.  Or how she’d fantasize about chucking it all for a box of chocolates and an uninterrupted bath.

Lizzie vents these frustrations in an e-mail and her life is shattered: James gets the message by mistake.  Lizzie soon finds herself uprooting her children to start over in a ramshackle garden cottage.  Now facing life – and the twins – alone, Lizzie struggles to reinvent herself and forget about her soon-to-be ex.  But when thoughts of James still haunt her, she begins to wonder if the best part of marriage starts after the fairy tale ends…