Lydia and Freddie. Freddie and Lydia. It’s been this way since Lydia Bird and Freddie Hunter were fourteen years old. But Lydia’s world turns upside down when Freddie dies on her 28th birthday because of a car accident. Lost and grieving, she starts taking experimental pills to help her sleep. Then the pills don’t just help her sleep: they take her to a world where Freddie lives. But real life goes on, whether she is asleep or awake. Now Lydia has to make a choice: stay in her dreamworld with Freddie, or figure out her new life without him.
There’s no sugarcoating the pain of losing the love of your life, but Josie Silver takes you through Lydia’s grieving process with empathy and understanding. I was genuinely afraid that the plot would turn into someone spiraling into drug addiction after the loss of a loved one (my heart wasn’t ready for that), but instead, The Two Lives of Lydia Bird is a painfully honest but still hopeful look at love and loss – the pain, denial, and anger of it all, but still managing to find your way out. The way out may not be fast, it will be painful, and will strain your relationships with your surviving loved ones, but it is possible.
The book is told from Lydia’s point-of-view, so we get a front row seat to everything that she’s feeling. She’s a fleshed-out character, with distinct motivations and thought processes. The secondary characters – Jonah Jones (Freddie’s best friend who was actually Lydia’s friend first), her sister Elle, and her mom – are also important to Lydia’s journey. Though we only see them in the context of Lydia’s journey, Ms. Silver writes Lydia to be observant enough that we get to see the other characters’ own pain. This is especially important for Jonah, who lost his best friend as well. We get to see how Lydia’s family tries so hard to be supportive and how much that support costs them.
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It’s not a secret that I have a soft spot for romance novels and young adult novels, so when 
A cute and funny read but not up to the standards of Mayle’s previous books. The Vintage Caper features a great lineup of characters. Sam Levitt is a likeable protagonist, as are his supporting cast of Sophie (his contact in Bordeaux) and Philippe (a journalist). Even the thief is likeable! You’ll end up siding with him instead of the egotistical Danny Roth. Mayle also does an excellent job of setting up the locations such that Paris, Bordeaux, and Marseille become characters in their own right. His writing makes you feel as if you’re right there with Sam, eating spectacular food and drinking Petrus. The gratuitous vintage-dropping was lost on non-wine enthusiast me but it also served the purpose of setting the tone of the book.
The Marseille Caper fares much better compared to TVC. Everything that made TVC worth reading is also in TMC – the characters, the setting, and the breezy writing style – but amped up. It’s a more satisfying and substantial read. Lots of food and wine porn but that’s to be expected.There’s no whodunnit element so it avoids that pitfall.