He’d have done everything differently if he’d known she’d be gone so soon…
When Lisa married Alex, she gave his life meaning. She was a professional astronomer; a stargazer. And when she gazed at Alex, she saw that behind his tough exterior was a man she could love.
Alex, Lisa and their young son Connor made a happy little universe. But when Lisa dies suddenly, their universe is destroyed. Alex is shattered by loss, and overwhelmed by the difficulties of being a single father to a six-year-old boy.
Then Alex meets four strangers. Two men and two women, who never met Lisa, but whose lives changed profoundly because she died. As Alex hears their stories, he begins to realise the world may not be as cruel and senseless as it seems. Perhaps, after all, the future is written in the stars…
It’s no secret that Dani Atkins is the ultimate queen of emotional fiction, capturing all of those moments in life which alter or change us in some catastrophic way. From birth to death, Atkins is able to pick apart the most sensitive and heart-breaking subjects in a beautiful manner, in order to deliver to her readers a novel so astutely aware of emotions, it’s impossible not to succumb to the tidal wave of feelings that will no doubt drown you.
Dani Atkins’ latest novel is no different, and falls exactly into the above category. A Sky Full of Stars bubbles over with heartache, pain, grief and loss, and it will surely smack you right in the gut with the sheer depths in which Atkins dives in order to capture the feelings felt by Alex, in such a profound and incredibly tender way. I’d be lying if I told you I’d got to the end of this novel without crying once. In fact, I found myself crying at numerous moments through the book, because it was just so rich with the sheer power of human emotion. It got to me, and not only the moments of despair, but the fleeting moments of happiness that were peppered throughout, too.
A Sky Full of Stars by Dani Atkins follows the lives of Alex and his young son Connor, and Molly, a primary school teacher. Written in alternating narratives, readers are able to slip and slide between these two separate lives, the realisation of knowing they are going to intertwine at some point ever-present, just on the periphery. Having recently lost his wife to a sudden tragedy, Alex and Connor are still in the very early stages of grief. Molly, recently the recipient of a new heart, is trying to figure out how to come back from thinking yourself as good as gone. I adore how Atkins never shies away from the raw and sometimes shocking complexities of real human life in her novels. She writes in such a way that truly opens your eyes to life and how different it is for people all over the world. The situation in which Alex and Molly come to know each other is out of this world, yet I couldn’t seem to tear my eyes away from the page once the realisation of their circumstances dawned on me. Not realising that his wife, Lisa, had signed up to be an organ donor, Molly becomes the woman who receives Lisa’s heart in order to save her own life. I mean, before the story even really got into its stride, that was already enough to set the tears off.
‘Had she felt it then, the moment when the sand in the hour-glass had started to trickle out?’
As I look back through my highlights in the novel, I can genuinely feel my stomach tighten when I skim over certain passages. Atkins explores the bond between father and son so perfectly. She highlights the tricky moments in which Alex feels lost and unsure of how to help his own son, and I can only imagine how hard of a position this would be. It’s clear that Connor shared such a special bond with his mother, and Atkins portrays Alex’s fear of not being able to fill his wife’s shoes in such a vivid way. It all made for tear-jerking reading. My heart ached for the man who suddenly was so out of his depth, when just months before, he and his wife had been an incredible team together. It was impossible not to feel for Alex, to want to reach into the pages and comfort him, tell him that it would all be okay, in time. The terror of suddenly being a single parent floods the chapters dedicated to Alex, and it absolutely broke my heart, again and again. I could only hope that with the love and support from his family and friends, Alex would eventually begin to see a light at the end of the tunnel.
Molly’s story was equally as moving, and again, I found myself reading the words through blurred, teary vision. After a virus leaves Molly’s heart failing, it’s only a matter of time before her own clock runs out. It is only down to the death of Alex’s wife that Molly is given the incredible chance to continue her life on earth. Once able to, Molly and Alex become close friends via letters they write to each other, and it’s impossible not to pick up on the subtle hints of something more than just friendship developing. But of course for Alex, he is forever wondering whether it’s Molly that he is attracted to, or whether it’s his wife’s heart that Molly now holds. What I loved about this was that I was never quite sure of where this would lead. I couldn’t be 100% certain that what I was feeling was correct, but this uncertainty was actually very enjoyable and made my curiosity towards the plot stronger.
Watching the friendship between not only Molly and Alex, but Molly and Mac, another donor recipient, develop, was utterly addictive. I couldn’t put this book down and found myself racing through the pages, eager to see where the numerous lives within this book would end up. It was magical, in a way that had me spellbound throughout, and my heart entirely wrapped up in the circumstances of these characters. I wanted nothing more than a happy ending for each of them, Jamie and Barbara included. They all felt so very real to me, and it didn’t take me long at all to begin to think of them as real people who I genuinely cared about. Atkins delivers to her readers the absolute truth of life in her latest novel, and that is that no matter how much pain or loss we may experience, life will go on, and it will become good again. Perhaps not the same, but good, nonetheless. With the help of family and friends, it is possible to learn to live and love again.
Needless to say, A Sky Full of Stars by Dani Atkins was a bold, robust and incredibly moving novel, one which I am sure I will recall for a long time to come. Emotion drenched every chapter, the characters leapt and danced amongst the pages, and I really cannot recommend this book enough to anyone who loves being welcomed into a story as if you’ve met these characters before. Thank you, Dani Atkins, for writing such a gorgeous story. To think of it makes my heart beat a little bit faster, and that in turn only makes me think of Molly.
Dani Atkins is an award-winning novelist. Her 2013 debut FRACTURED (published as THEN AND ALWAYS in North America) has been translated into seventeen languages and has sold more than half a million copies since first publication in the UK.
Dani is the author of five other bestselling novels (THE STORY OF US, OUR SONG, THIS LOVE, WHILE I WAS SLEEPING and A MILLION A DREAMS) and PERFECT STRANGERS, a standalone eBook novella. In 2018, THIS LOVE won the Romantic Novel of the Year Award at the RNA awards in London.
Dani lives in a small village in Hertfordshire with her husband, one Siamese cat and a very soppy Border Collie.
Follow Dani on twitter @AtkinsDani or get in touch on Facebook at http://www.facebook.com/daniatkinsautor
You can purchase your copy of A Sky Full of Stars by Dani Atkins here.
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