This book is over 400 pages long, and until about page 300, I was rating it as poorly as I had 'The Trouble with Goats and Sheep'. I felt that Cannon patronises the narrator, Flo, though she has an interesting use of metaphor and description which she almost feels the need to 'put in inverted commas'. Towards the end, I started to understand the picture that Cannon is painting -I can't say more without doing a spoiler alert. Which doesn't mean I altogether understand the back story which is brought into the present on a slow burn throughout the book. Nevertheless, this is an interesting (frightening - I'm way too near that point myself) portrayal of old age, and not one to relish. A more interesting and thought-provoking book than 'The Trouble with Sheep and Goats'. ( )

Florence has fallen on the floor of her flat at the Cherry Tree Home for the elderly. As she lies there, she ponders the three things about her best friend Elsie and if the arrival of a new resident that looks exactly like Ronnie. But Ronnie died 40 years ago. Or did he? Subsequent chapters unfurl with what happened last month, mixed in with what happened 40 years ago. Flo is a very unreliable narrator, so you're not sure what is real or not and you're kept guessing about her secret and what really happened with Ronnie all those years ago. ( )

Florence suffers from dementia. After a fall in her room that leaves her unable to move or call for help, she relives in her mind a traumatic event that occurred when was a young woman. The story tells of this event as if the recalling has just recently taken place. A sad but healing recall and how it affects Florence and the people around her. Kirkus: Two friends work at solving a mystery that spiderwebs back in time, not unlike the young girls in Cannon?s debut, The Trouble with Goats and Sheep (2016), but this book is set much later in life at an assisted living facility.As long as she can remember, Florence?s best friend has been Elsie. They both think of Florence?s memory as spotty, though, and Elsie often challenges her to practice calling up facts from their shared past. Strangely�and it is one of many peculiarities permeating the book¥the chapters that Florence narrates exude authority, a good eye for detail, and a crotchety independence that unfortunately puts her on probation with the assistant director at her housing complex. This makes it very bad timing for Ronnie Butler to appear, masquerading as a new resident, because Ronnie Butler was supposed to have drowned in 1953 and, before that, was a violent man who infested and harmed Elsie?s family. Florence is terrified; she believes he has come back for her but can?t explain why. Maddeningly, she communicates less efficiently with authorities than with the reader, and they aren?t inclined to believe her anyway. But what begins as a tale evocative of The Yellow Wallpaper turns into an amateur detective story when Florence confides in the kind and clever General Jack, another resident, and they go hunting down clues to Ronnie's motives and the identity he's stolen. The tone then shifts once more (at the seaside, appropriately) to something bittersweet and pensive, concerned with the significance of any one life as well as the texture of devotion. The novel breathes with suspense, providing along the way piercing, poetic descriptions, countless tiny mysteries, and breathtaking little reveals. Some outcomes seem obvious, but enough is left unsaid to keep readers unsure of anything until the last chapter. Perhaps not quite then, either.A rich portrait of old age and friendship stretched over a fascinating frame.

Thank heaven for Elsie, Florence Claybourne’s lifelong friend. What would Florence have done without her all these years? What would Florence do without her now, faced with the sinister presence of Gabriel Price? Thank heaven for Elsie.

Mr. Price has just moved into Cherry Tree Home for the Elderly, where Florence and Elsie live, and he is identical to their mortal enemy, a man who died sixty years ago – even the scar at the corner of his mouth is a replica of the scar borne by the despicable Ronnie Butler at the time of his death.

Is Gabriel Price really Ronnie Butler? Is he gaslighting Florence by planting contraband in her flat and accusing her of spying on him, or is Florence showing signs of dementia? Is she spying on Mr. Price and then forgetting that she’s doing it?

More to the point: will Florence ever get rescued from the floor of her flat, from where she tells her story after having fallen?

And what’s the third thing about Elsie?

I listened to the audiobook narrated by Paula Wilcox; she chose to use an accent that was challenging to listen to, with its sing-song quality and rapid-fire delivery. Although I am rating this well-crafted story at four stars, I might have enjoyed the experience more if I’d read the book; as I listened to the closing paragraphs I suspected I had possibly missed some of the subtler nuances of the story.

I expected a mystery – and there is a mystery component. By the time I finished the book, though, I recognized that Three Things About Elsie is about the nature of friendship, memory and self-preservation. ( )

A long second. What a beautiful concept.

Struggling to rate this one because I really loved it and I teared up when I finished it, but it was also too slow for me to love love. I want to go three, but I'll go four, for all the characters that were so kind and who grew on their own accord throughout.

Of course, it was very obvious from page three Elsie was a fragment of Florence's imagination, but does that make it any less beautiful? ( )