The Woman Who Went to Bed for a Year by Sue Townsend

What a peculiar story…still not sure if I loved it or not? It was hilarious at times but others were rather confusing and shocking in others. The story is about a mother of twins who, once they have gone to university, decides to simply go to bed. Her exhaustion is apparent because she simply cannot find the strength to leave the bed, which leads to many other strange but funny events. For example, once she had been in bed for at least 6 months, people started campaigning outside her house in solidarity, believing that she was protesting for something. The media started to use her story as support for other campaigns and her intentions are misconstrued (as they often are within the media). It really was a strange book but in a world full of expectations and people to please it was a bold move to simply stay in bed all day and night. It is also because of this move that she found out who really cares for her, which at times was really quite depressing. Her husband and children are rather strange, which makes the storyline rather interesting but sometimes it was truly so frustrating! I kept wanting to defend Eva, the woman who went to bed, because I often agreed with her!

In summary, I enjoyed this book and got through it very quickly, which obviously means that it was addictive! I believe that there are certain lessons to be learnt in this book and it would be interesting if there was someone that interpreted the book the same way I have. One of the main lessons I learnt from Eva was that you should never compromise who you are for anyone else under any circumstances.