The Disorganisation of Celia Stone by Emma Young is set up as if you are reading Celia’s diary and checking out all her charts and lists.
Celia suffers from crippling anxiety and has to have every aspect of her life organised. She also has to organise her partner’s life.
She has charts and lists for everything — from what food and how much can be eaten, how much alcohol can be consumed, exercise plans, and lists for when they will visit people. Her lists even cover when she’ll buy a new lipstick and what shops she can and can’t purchase clothing from.
All this planning should make life easier, but because Celia is taking things to extremes it makes life much more complicated and stressful.
When Celia’s partner suggests that it’s time they started a family, it throws Celia into a spin. She then discovers that her rules have caused her to have health issues, so she tries hard to deal with the mental and physical challenges that have become a huge part of her life.
In this story, Emma Young explores how difficult it is to battle any type of mental illness, and it also shows how it impacts those around the person who is battling these challenges.
I so badly wanted to see Celia get her life back on track and really start living instead of just existing. Once that started to happen, I felt such joy for her and held out hope for a future filled with fun and laughter.
I found this book to be thought-provoking and it gave me some insight into the battles faced by those with mental health issues.
According to some reviews, if you were a fan of Bridget Jones’s Diary, then you may like this book.
A selection of our Beauty and Lace Club Members are reading The Disorganisation of Celia Stone by Emma Young. You can read their comments below, or add your own review.
Im a Mum of 3 beautiful girls.
An avid reader that loves to travel but lacks the funds to venture far and wide constantly. A perfumeaholic with an addiction to beauty and skincare.
If not found with my head in a book or on a plane I can be found spending hours upon hour in Doctors and Hospital waiting rooms as part of my job as a Carer
Emma Young did a amazing job of writing a book that touched on so many hard hitting subjects, while still feeling light hearted. Set up as diary entries it helps you connect to the MC without lots of world building, and too much internal monologue.
I think everyone will be able to relate to this book in different ways. Subjects like grief, mental health, eating disorders, fertility, marriage, friendships and work life balance are all touched, and the journey you go on with MC Celia Stone makes you feel like you’re growing as a individual with her.
Celia has a type A personality, is very controlling and anxious, Emma does a great job of conveying this through the diary entries. You can see Celia’s thought patterns and how she spirals, and try’s to control different aspects of her life to be able to control the outcome. Her growth of letting go of that control is amazing, and seeing the support her partner, friends and family give makes it better. It’s a realistic and relatable portrayal of the journey one takes, when trying to be a better and healthier person, while battling anxiety and trying to maintain control.
I was lucky enough to be given this book by Beauty and Lace Magazine and Fremantle Press to read and review.
The Disorganisation of Celia Stone by Emma Young was a very witty and quite impossible to put down read to say the very least and I really loved the Diary format that it was written in.
Meet 30 something Celia Stone. She is super organised to say the very least. She has her life planned out to a tee. She has a promising writing career, she is utterly devoted to her partner, a strict fitness routine and she keeps it all running like clockwork. When her hubby suggests it’s time to start a family, she just can’t see how a baby is going to fit into an already jam-packed life and everything she wants to achieve without losing something in the process. Her yearlong diary illustrates the ups and downs that a lot of us can identify with as well as revelations through her journey of self-discovery and what I thought was an unexpected but perfect way.
Thanks to Beauty and Lace and Freemantle Press for my copy of The Disorganization of Celia Stone.
Although I enjoyed this novel immensely, I didn’t find it at all funny, despite the promises on the cover. I went in expecting something a little light-hearted, but found instead a story that was emotional and moving.
Celia Stone is very focused on being organised. She believes it’s the path to financial freedom and an early retirement. More, it’ll improve her whole life: her marriage, her social life, her family, her career. Unfortunately life seems quite determined not to be organised, but Celia is equally determined to overcome these constant blips.
Then Celia’s husband asks if it’s time for a baby and Celia goes into a spin. Babies are the ultimate forces of chaos. How could she possibly organise a baby?
Celia is a very relatable character. I think almost everyone has at least a vague sense that they “should” be more organised, and a lot of people have had spurts of trying the sorts of things Celia does. She’s not particularly self aware, and she’s fairly judgemental, but she’s also loving and loyal and basically kind.
Because Celia is very relatable – and predominately likeable, although she has her moments – readers will find it easy to empathise with her. That draws you into her journey and makes you care a lot about what happens to her.
The novel is largely a journey of self discovery, as Celia realises that some of her behaviour has reached unhealthy levels, and explores the underlying causes. Very few people will be able to read this without being moved by these slow realisations.
The people who surround Celia – her husband, family and friends – are all strongly drawn and vivid. Although we’re not drawn to understand them in the same depth, they’re all believable and a strong part of Celia’s story.
This is a well written novel. Because it’s in the form of diary entries, it’s a slightly choppy style at times, but that doesn’t make it difficult to read. The background is vividly drawn and the setting (Perth) comes to life just enough.
As I said, I found the promises of humor inaccurate. Sure, there’s some gentle amusement once or twice, but I just didn’t find this a funny book. It was quite powerful, however, a subtle but strong exploration of the things that form character and behaviour. It’s very readable, and I enjoyed it immensely. However, for me it tips towards the serious end of the spectrum.
Thankyou beauty and Lace for selecting me to read this fantastic book!
Admittedly I initially struggled to get into this book because of the way it is written, I found the Diary/Journal format to give it a stop start sort of feel. Once I got past that I really enjoyed it. I found Celia a really relatable character feeling the need to “control” all situations around me and with a health dose of anxiety thrown in along side it lol. I feel like it was very accurately portrayed.
I’m glad to see so many other positive reviews for this story! I will absolutely be reading this again and again throughout the years
The Disorganisation of Celia Stone by Emma Young was a book that I absolutely loved. So much that I did not want to put it down or to end!
Celia was quite the character and when I started reading this, I was actually in awe of her. Her life was perfect. She had so much control over everything, and that kind of discipline is something I am severely lacking! I was fascinated by her lists, and it made me think about how much more I should be doing, what more that I should be grateful for and even more aware of in my own life! I could easily relate to her in so many other ways though too. The overcommitting, the trying to please everyone, the anxiety, the wanting to retire early (hehe!) amongst other things, some, very personal.
It was sad and, in a way, discouraging when things started to slowly unravel for Celia. However, she did not give up easily and it was amazing the lengths she went to, to try and keep things together. Then there was almost a sense of relief when slowly she starts to understand (perhaps not fully accepting straight away) the why’s, where’s and how’s that things are going wrong. Her slowly letting go even opens her eyes up to the strength of the support group of her friends, husband and family around her that she never fully realised before.
This book was terrific, and I find it hard to express how moved I really was after reading this. I loved Celia, I loved her friends and family, and I loved the storyline. I felt I just ‘got’ Celia and this book left me feeling very contemplative about things.
A huge thanks to Beauty and Lace and Fremantle Press for allowing me the chance to read this book and discover Emma Young as an author.
PS. Can I also make mention of how awesome it was to read that 50% of Emma’s royalties will be going towards Beyond Zero Emissions. What an incredible person and thing to do!