Genre: General Fiction

#BookReview More or Less Maddy by Lisa Genova @ScoutPressBooks @SimonSchusterCA #MoreOrLessMaddy #LisaGenova #SimonSchusterCA

categories: 10/10, Book Review, General Fiction, Noteworthy Book Releases, Women's Fiction
#BookReview More or Less Maddy by Lisa Genova @ScoutPressBooks @SimonSchusterCA #MoreOrLessMaddy #LisaGenova #SimonSchusterCA Title: More or Less Maddy

Author: Lisa Genova

Published by: Scout Press on Jan. 14, 2025

Genres: General Fiction, Women's Fiction

Pages: 368

Format: ARC, Paperback

Source: Simon & Schuster Canada

Book Rating: 10/10

A breathless, riveting novel about a young woman diagnosed with bipolar disorder who rejects the stability and approval found in a traditionally “normal” life for a career in stand-up comedy.

Maddy Banks is just like any other stressed-out freshman at NYU. Between schoolwork, exams, navigating life in the city, and a recent breakup, it’s normal to be feeling overwhelmed. It doesn’t help that she’s always felt like the odd one out in her picture-perfect Connecticut family. But Maddy’s latest low is devastatingly low, and she goes on an antidepressant. She begins to feel good, dazzling in fact, and she soon spirals high into a wild and terrifying mania that culminates in a diagnosis of bipolar disorder.

As she struggles to find her way in this new reality, navigating the complex effects bipolar has on her identity, her relationships, and her life dreams, Maddy will have to figure out how to manage being both too much and not enough.

With her signature “deep empathy and insight” (Booklist), Harvard-trained neuroscientist and New York Times bestselling authorLisa Genova has crafted another profoundly moving novel that makes complicated mental health issues accessible and human. More or Less Maddy is destined to become another classic like Still Alice.

Review:

Moving, memorable, and compelling!

More or Less Maddy is an intimate, thought-provoking novel that immerses you into the life of Maddy Banks, a bipolar young woman who is struggling to find purpose in her life while being dependent on medication, consistently disappointing those she loves, and feeling like a prisoner to a mind that never wants to rest.

The prose is evocative and sincere. The characters are multi-layered, vulnerable, and eccentric. And the plot is a touching tale of life, love, family, friendship, desires, needs, dreams, mania, suicide ideation, standup comedy, complex relationships, and mental health.

Overall, More or Less Maddy is an immersive, emotional, sensitive tale by Genova that does a remarkable job of reminding us of the lifelong struggles for those suffering from a mental health disorder to perform normal daily activities, forge true friendships, and experience love, while also highlighting just how easily the greatest of highs can quickly transition to devastating, tragic lows.

 

This novel is available now.

Pick up a copy from your favourite retailer or from one of the following links.

         

 

 

Thank you to Simon & Schuster Canada for gifting me a copy in exchange for an honest review.

 

About Lisa Genova

Acclaimed as the Oliver Sacks of fiction and the Michael Crichton of brain science, Lisa Genova is the New York Times bestselling author of Still Alice, Left Neglected, Love Anthony, Inside the O’Briens, and Remember: The Science of Memory and the Art of Forgetting. Still Alice was adapted into an Oscar–winning film starring Julianne Moore, Alec Baldwin, and Kristen Stewart. Lisa graduated valedictorian from Bates College with a degree in biopsychology and holds a PhD in neuroscience from Harvard University. She is featured in the documentary films To Not Fade Away and Have You Heard About Greg. Her TED talks on Alzheimer’s disease and memory have been viewed over eleven million times.

Photo by Greg Mentzer

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#BookReview The Spoiled Heart by Sunjeev Sahota @PenguinRandomCA #SunjeevSahota #TheSpoiledHeart #PenguinReads

categories: 8/10, Book Review, General Fiction
#BookReview The Spoiled Heart by Sunjeev Sahota @PenguinRandomCA #SunjeevSahota #TheSpoiledHeart #PenguinReads Title: The Spoiled Heart

Author: Sunjeev Sahota

Published by: Knopf Canada on Apr. 16, 2024

Genres: General Fiction

Pages: 336

Format: ARC, Paperback

Source: Penguin Random House Canada

Book Rating: 8/10

A brilliant and riveting story of ambition, love, family secrets, and unintended consequences, from “bold storyteller” (The New Yorker) and two-time Booker Prize nominee Sunjeev Sahota

Nayan Olak keeps seeing Helen Fletcher around town. She’s returned with her teenage son to live in the run-down house at the end of the lane, and—though she’s strangely guarded—Nayan can’t help but be drawn to her. He hasn’t risked love since losing his young family in a terrible accident twenty years earlier.

In the wake of the tragedy, Nayan’s labor union, long a cornerstone of his community, became the center of his life: a way for him to channel his energies into making the world a better—fairer, as he sees it—place. Now, he’s decided to mount a run for the leadership. But his campaign pits him against a newcomer, Megha, who quickly proves to be a more formidable challenger than he anticipated.

As Nayan’s differences with Megha spin out of control, complicating the ideals he’s always held dear, he grows closer to Helen—and unknowingly barrels toward long-held secrets about how their pasts might be connected. Suddenly, much more is threatened than his chances of winning.

In one sense a tragedy in the classic mold, tracing one man’s seemingly inexorable fall, The Spoiled Heart is also an explosively contemporary story of how a few words or a single action—to one person careless, to another, charged—can trigger a cascade of unimaginable consequences. A vivid and multi-layered exploration of the mysteries of the heart, how community is forged and broken, and the shattering impact of secrets and assumptions alike, it is a blazing achievement from one of Britain’s foremost living writers.

Review:

Nuanced, tragic, and compelling!

The Spoiled Heart is an intriguing, heart-tugging tale set in modern-day Britain that takes you into the life of Nayan Olak, a middle-aged man of Indian descent who is struggling with the continued grief of losing his mother and son in a fire years ago, the ongoing care of a father who he despises but also loves, a run for the union general secretary position that has turned into a fiery, mudslinging affair, and a blossoming romance with a white woman who has troubles and secrets of her own.

The prose is effortless and tender. The characters are multilayered, scarred, and vulnerable. And the plot is an absorbing tale of life, loss, love, reputation, familial dynamics, class division, race, societal prejudices, and tragedy.

Overall, The Spoiled Heart is a tense, captivating, sobering tale by Sahota that reminds us that families are complicated and messy, the choices we make often have far-reaching consequences, and long-buried secrets somehow always find their way to the surface.

 

This novel is available now.

Pick up a copy from your favourite retailer or from one of the following links.

         

 

 

Thank you to Penguin Random House Canada for gifting me a copy in exchange for an honest review.

 

About Sunjeev Sahota

Sunjeev Sahota is the author of three novels: China Room, which was longlisted for the Booker Prize and a finalist for the American Library Association's Carnegie Medal; The Year of the Runaways, which was shortlisted for the Booker Prize and the Dylan Thomas Prize, and was awarded a European Union Prize for Literature; and Ours are the Streets. In 2013, he was named one of Granta’s twenty Best of Young British Novelists of the decade. He lives in Sheffield, England, with his family.

Photo by GL Portrait / Alamy Stock Photo.

#BookReview Swift River by Essie Chambers @SimonSchusterCA #SwiftRiver #EssieChambers #SimonSchusterCA

categories: 8.5/10, Book Review, General Fiction, Historical Fiction
#BookReview Swift River by Essie Chambers @SimonSchusterCA #SwiftRiver #EssieChambers #SimonSchusterCA Title: Swift River

Author: Essie J. Chambers

Published by: Simon & Schuster on Jun. 4, 2024

Genres: General Fiction, Historical Fiction

Pages: 304

Format: ARC, Paperback

Source: Simon & Schuster Canada

Book Rating: 8.5/10

It’s the summer of 1987 in Swift River, and Diamond Newberry is learning how to drive. Ever since her Pop disappeared seven years ago, she and her mother hitchhike everywhere they go. But that’s not the only reason Diamond stands out: she’s teased relentlessly about her weight, and since Pop’s been gone, she is the only Black person in all of Swift River. This summer, Ma is determined to declare Pop legally dead so that they can collect his life insurance money, get their house back from the bank, and finally move on.

But when Diamond receives a letter from a relative she’s never met, key elements of Pop’s life are uncovered, and she is introduced to two generations of African American Newberry women, whose lives span the 20th century and reveal a much larger picture of prejudice and abandonment, of love and devotion. As pieces of their shared past become clearer, Diamond gains a sense of her place in the world and in her family. But how will what she’s learned of the past change her future?

A story of first friendships, family secrets, and finding the courage to let go, Swift River is a sensational debut about how history shapes us and heralds the arrival of a major new literary talent.

Review:

Raw, atmospheric, and insightful!

Swift River is a descriptive, moving novel that sweeps you away to New England in 1987 and into the life of biracial teen Diamond Newberry, the only young girl of colour in her whole small town who, after her father suddenly disappears in 1980, struggles to come to grips with her burgeoning weight and a constant sense of being adrift and disconnected due to a lack of relationship and any knowledge into her paternal ancestry.

The prose is vivid and expressive. The characters are vulnerable, lonely, and adrift. And the plot is a heart-tugging, compelling tale of life, love, loss, family, friendship, poverty, prejudice, racism, community, courage, desperation, self-reflection, and coming of age.

Overall, Swift River is a rich, gritty, absorbing tale by Chambers that transports you to another time and place and immerses you so thoroughly into the feelings, lives, and personalities of the characters you can’t help but be enthralled, emotional, and invested from start to finish.

 

This novel is available now.

Pick up a copy from your favourite retailer or from one of the following links.

        

 

 

Thank you to Simon & Schuster Canada for gifting me a copy in exchange for an honest review.

 

About Essie J. Chambers

Essie Chambers earned her MFA in creative writing from Columbia University and has received fellowships from the MacDowell Vermont Studio Center, and Baldwin for the Arts. A former film and television executive, she was a producer on the documentary Descendant, which was released by the Obamas’ Higher Ground production company and Netflix in 2022. Swift River is her debut novel.

Photograph by Christine Jean Chambers.

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#BookReview Forgotten on Sunday by Valérie Perrin (translated by Hildegarde Serle) @EuropaEditions @PGCBooks #ForgottenOnSunday #ValeriePerrin #PGCBooks #EuropaEditions

categories: 9/10, Book Review, General Fiction
#BookReview Forgotten on Sunday by Valérie Perrin (translated by Hildegarde Serle) @EuropaEditions @PGCBooks #ForgottenOnSunday #ValeriePerrin #PGCBooks #EuropaEditions Title: Forgotten on Sunday

Author: Valérie Perrin

Published by: Europa Editions on Jun. 14, 2024

Genres: General Fiction

Pages: 316

Format: ARC, Paperback

Source: Publishers Group Canada

Book Rating: 9/10

An unforgettable story about an unlikely friendship and about healing the wounds of a broken past from the million-copy bestselling author of Fresh Water for Flowers.

Justine is 21 years old and has lived with her grandparents and her cousin Jules since the death of her parents. As a nursing assistant at a retirement home, she spends much of her days listening to her residents’ stories. 

After bonding with Hélène, an almost 100-year-old resident, the two women slowly reveal their stories to one another. Whilst Justine helps Hélène to relive her memories of love and war, Hélène encourages Justine to confront the secrets of her own past, and the loss she keeps buried deep within. 

One day, a mysterious phone detailing a shocking revelation shakes the retirement home to its core. At once humorous and melancholic, Valérie Perrin’s novel depicts the consequences of undeclared love and, in her inimitable way, portrays once again how the past is never really past.

Review:

Captivating, melancholic, and sensitive!

Forgotten on Sunday is a heart-tugging, character-driven tale set in France during the 1930s, as well as present day, that takes you into the lives of two main characters. Justine, a young nursing aide who after being raised by her grandparents from an early age after the sudden loss of her parents, spends her days caring for the elderly and writing down all the stories they choose to share, and Hélène a ninety-six-year-old woman who as her life slowly comes to an end reveals a well-lived life that was bursting with passion, pain, tragedy, and war.

The prose is elegant and rich. The characters are troubled, sympathetic, and endearing. And the plot is a moving tale about life, love, loss, lies, emotion, betrayal, family, friendship, secrets, heartbreak, guilt, grief, hope, and regret.

Overall, Forgotten on Sunday is another immersive, touching, astute tale by Perrin that highlights once again her innate ability to delve into all the messy emotional and psychological entanglements that exist between family members, lovers, and friends, and proves why year after year her novels garner enormous amounts of high praise.

 

This book is available now.

Pick up a copy from your favourite retailer or from one of the following links.

        

 

 

Thank you to PGC Books for gifting me a copy in exchange for an honest review.

 

About Valérie Perrin

Valérie Perrin was born in 1967 in Remiremont, in the Vosges Mountains, France. She grew up in Burgundy and settled in Paris in 1986. Her novel The Forgotten Sunday (2015) won the Booksellers Choice Award and the paperback edition has been long-selling best-seller since publication. Her English-language debut, Fresh Water for Flowers (Europa, 2020) won the Maison de la Presse Prize, the Paperback Readers Prize, and was named a 2020 ABA Indies Introduce and Indie Next List title. It has been translated into over thirty languages. Figaro Littéraire named Perrin one of the ten best-selling authors in France in 2019, and in Italy, Fresh Water for Flowers was the best selling book of 2020. Perrin now lives in Normandy.

Photo © Valentin Lauvergne

Goodreads

#BookReview A Good Life by Virginie Grimaldi (translated by Hildegarde Serle) @EuropaEditions @PGCBooks #AGoodLife #VirginieGrimaldi #PGCBooks #EuropaEditions

categories: 8.5/10, Book Review, General Fiction, Women's Fiction
#BookReview A Good Life by Virginie Grimaldi (translated by Hildegarde Serle) @EuropaEditions @PGCBooks #AGoodLife #VirginieGrimaldi #PGCBooks #EuropaEditions Title: A Good Life

Author: Virginie Grimaldi

Published by: Europa Editions on Jun. 7, 2024

Genres: General Fiction, Women's Fiction

Pages: 288

Format: ARC, Paperback

Source: Publishers Group Canada

Book Rating: 8.5/10

Full of humor and compassion, a profound exploration of sisterhood, healing, and the ineffable beauty of life from France‘s most beloved contemporary novelist

Laughter, tears, the transformative power of love, unexpected revelations, and striking natural these are the ingredients that combine to make best-selling author Virginie Grimaldi’s American debut the feel-good read of 2024. Grimaldi is among France’s top ten contemporary authors and her uplifting, unputdownable literary novels have quickly garnered her millions of adoring fans. This, her American debut, is among her most delicately wrought and emotionally compelling novels to date. 

Emma and Agathe are sisters. They were thick as thieves when they were young but have always been as different as can be. Agathe, the younger sister, is disorderly, chaotic, and fiery. Five years older, Emma has always been the more mature sister, the defender, the protector, the worrier. Their relationship as adults is scarred by a tragedy that transformed their happy, ordinary childhoods into something much more complex and challenging. For a long time, Emma hasn’t wanted to be involved in Agathe’s life. But then they must return together to the Basque Country, to the house of their adored grandmother, to empty out her home and in the process to reconcile, to remember, and to pour out what is in their hearts. 

The story alternates between Agathe and Emma’s childhood and their present day, with everything in between, and readers see them as young girls, teenagers, young women, mothers, wives, partners, individuals, sisters. This is a story that encompasses whole lives, complex lives, women’s lives, asking all the while how the scars of the past can be healed and what, in the end, is a good life.

Review:

Tender, sincere, and memorable!

A Good Life is an intimate, poignant tale that sweeps you away to France and immerses you into the lives of two sisters, Emma and Agathe, as after being estranged for several years, they come together to clean out their late grandmother’s home and discover how to accept the things they cannot change, confront a past littered with tragedy and heartbreak, acknowledge and repair long-strained relationships, and ultimately learn to savour every moment.

The writing is effortless and polished. The characters are multi-layered, genuine, and scarred. And the plot, including all the subplots, skillfully intertwines and unravels into a delightfully touching tale about life, love, loss, guilt, grief, family drama, secrets, happiness, self-discovery, and sisterhood.

Overall, A Good Life is a beautiful mix of hope, heart, and healing that is not only a humorous, emotive, lovely novel by Virginie Grimaldi but one which I don’t think anyone could possibly read and not be completely absorbed and moved.

 

This book is available now.

Pick up a copy from your favourite retailer or from one of the following links.

          

 

 

Thank you to PGC Books for gifting me a copy in exchange for an honest review.

 

About Virginie Grimaldi

Virginie Grimaldi was born in 1977 in Bordeaux, where she still lives. She is the author of nine novels and was the most read French writer for three consecutive years (in 2019, 2020, and 2021). Her novels have been bestsellers in Europe and have been translated into more than twenty languages.

Photo Pascal Ito © Flammarion.

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#BookReview The Collected Regrets of Clover by Mikki Brammer @mikkibrammer @StMartinsPress #TheCollectedRegretsOfClover #MikkiBrammer #StMartinsPress #SMPInfluencers

categories: 8.5/10, Book Review, Contemporary Romance, General Fiction
#BookReview The Collected Regrets of Clover by Mikki Brammer @mikkibrammer @StMartinsPress #TheCollectedRegretsOfClover #MikkiBrammer #StMartinsPress #SMPInfluencers Title: The Collected Regrets of Clover

Author: Mikki Brammer

Published by: St. Martin's Press on May 21, 2024

Genres: Contemporary Romance, General Fiction

Pages: 336

Format: Paperback

Source: St. Martin's Press

Book Rating: 8.5/10

What’s the point of giving someone a beautiful death if you can’t give yourself a beautiful life?

From the day she watched her kindergarten teacher drop dead during a dramatic telling of Peter Rabbit, Clover Brooks has felt a stronger connection with the dying than she has with the living. After the beloved grandfather who raised her dies alone while she is traveling, Clover becomes a death doula in New York City, dedicating her life to ushering people peacefully through their end-of-life process.

Clover spends so much time with the dying that she has no life of her own, until the final wishes of a feisty old woman send Clover on a trip across the country to uncover a forgotten love story––and perhaps, her own happy ending. As she finds herself struggling to navigate the uncharted roads of romance and friendship, Clover is forced to examine what she really wants, and whether she’ll have the courage to go after it.

Probing, clever, and hopeful, The Collected Regrets of Clover is perfect for readers of The Midnight Library and Eleanor Oliphant is Completely Fine as it turns the normally taboo subject of death into a reason to celebrate life.

Review:

Absorbing, heartfelt, and sweet!

The Collected Regrets of Clover is a heartwarming, compelling tale that takes you on a journey into the life of Clover Brooks, a death doula who after helping many people pass into the next life and compiling and reviewing a list of their regrets, finally discovers the importance of taking chances, embracing change, and finding contentment.

The prose is light and hopeful. The characters are complex, authentic, and supportive. And the plot is a delightful tale about life, loss, family, kindness, love, self-discovery, happiness, romance, grief, death, and moving on.

Overall, The Collected Regrets of Clover is a tender, uplifting, nostalgic tale by Brammer, complete with strong, endearing characters, a touching storyline, and an insightful look into remorse and the unbreakable ties that bind us to those we love.

 

This book is available in paperback now. 

Pick up a copy from your favourite retailer or from the following link.

 

       

 

 

Thank you to St. Martin’s Press for gifting me a copy in an exchange for an honest review.

 

About Mikki Brammer

Mikki Brammer is an Australian journalist based in New York City, by way of France and Spain. She writes about design, architecture and art for publications such as Architectural Digest, Dwell and ELLE Decor. The Collected Regrets of Clover is her debut novel.

Photo Credit: Mark Wickens

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#BookReview A Great Country by Shilpi Somaya Gowda @PenguinRandomCA #ShilpiSomayaGowda #AGreatCountry #PenguinReads

categories: 9/10, Book Review, General Fiction
#BookReview A Great Country by Shilpi Somaya Gowda @PenguinRandomCA #ShilpiSomayaGowda #AGreatCountry #PenguinReads Title: A Great Country

Author: Shilpi Somaya Gowda

Published by: Doubleday Canada on Mar. 26, 2024

Genres: General Fiction

Pages: 336

Format: ARC, Paperback

Source: Penguin Random House Canada

Book Rating: 9/10

From the New York Times bestselling author, a novel in the tradition of Celeste Ng’s Little Fires Everywhere, exploring the ties and fractures of a close-knit Indian-American family in the aftermath of a violent encounter with the police.

Pacific Hills, California: Gated communities, ocean views, well-tended lawns, serene pools, and now the new home of the Shah family. For the Shah parents, who came to America twenty years earlier with little more than an education and their new marriage, this move represents the culmination of years of hard work and dreaming. For their children, born and raised in America, success is not so simple.

For the most part, these differences among the five members of the Shah family are minor irritants, arguments between parents and children, older and younger siblings. But one Saturday night, the twelve-year-old son is arrested. The fallout from that event will shake each family member’s perception of themselves as individuals, as community members, as Americans, and will lead each to consider: how do we define success? At what cost comes ambition? And what is our role and responsibility in the cultural mosaic of modern America?

For readers of The Vanishing Half by Brit Bennett and Such a Fun Age by Kiley Reid, A Great Country explores themes of immigration, generational conflict, social class and privilege as it reconsiders the myth of the model minority and questions the price of the American dream.

Review:

Astute, fast-paced, and thought-provoking!

A Great Country is a nuanced, absorbing tale set in Pacific Hills, California that takes you into the lives of the Indian American Shah family as their lives get turned upside down when the youngest member of the family, twelve-year-old Ajay, is brutally arrested and they must each individually confront their conflicting feelings and experiences with systemic racism, prejudice, privilege, controversy, reputation, and ableism.

The prose is well-turned and fluid. The characters are flawed, troubled, and confused. And the plot is a moving tale of life, loss, shame, reputation, ostracism, class division, suffering, friendship, affluence, culture, and familial drama.

Overall, A Great Country is a hopeful, compelling, multi-generational saga by Gowda that is a good reminder that family can be frustrating, messy, secretive, and sometimes hard to love, but they can also be surprising, supportive, loyal, and the only true place that feels like home.

 

This novel is available now.

Pick up a copy from your favourite retailer or from one of the following links.

         

 

 

Thank you to Penguin Random House Canada for gifting me a copy in exchange for an honest review.

 

About Shilpi Somaya Gowda

SHILPI SOMAYA GOWDA was born and raised in Toronto, Canada. Her previous novels, Secret Daughter, The Golden Son and The Shape of Family became international bestsellers, selling over two million copies worldwide, in over 30 languages. She holds degrees from Stanford University and the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, where she was a Morehead-Cain scholar. She lives in California with her husband and children.

Photo by Alissa Rose Photography

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#BookReview Good Material by Dolly Alderton @PenguinRandomCA #GoodMaterial #DollyAlderton #PenguinReads

categories: 8/10, Book Review, Contemporary Romance, General Fiction
#BookReview Good Material by Dolly Alderton @PenguinRandomCA #GoodMaterial #DollyAlderton #PenguinReads Title: Good Material

Author: Dolly Alderton

Published by: Doubleday Canada on Jan. 30, 2024

Genres: Contemporary Romance, General Fiction

Pages: 336

Format: Paperback

Source: Penguin Random House Canada

Book Rating: 8/10

From the bestselling author of Ghosts and Everything I Know About Love: a story of heartbreak and friendship and how to survive both.

Andy’s story wasn’t meant to turn out this way. Living out of a suitcase in his best friends’ spare room, waiting for his career as a stand-up comedian to finally take off, he struggles to process the life-ruining end of his relationship with the only woman he’s ever truly loved.

As he tries to solve the seemingly unsolvable mystery of his broken relationship, he contends with career catastrophe, social media paranoia, a rapidly dwindling friendship group and the growing suspicion that, at 35, he really should have figured this all out by now.

Andy has a lot to learn, not least his ex-girlfriend’s side of the story.

Warm, wise, funny and achingly relatable, Dolly Alderton’s highly-anticipated second novel is about the mystery of what draws us together – and what pulls us apart – the pain of really growing up, and the stories we tell about our lives.

Review:

Witty, tender, and authentic!

Good Material is a snappy, insightful tale that takes you into the life of the disillusioned, thirty-five-year-old comedian Andy as he struggles to juggle a lacklustre career, life as a single thirtysomething, a sudden end to a relationship he thought was going well, the intricacies of dating younger women, and a friend group that all seem to have their stuff together and are getting married and having babies.

The writing is genuine and direct. The characters are lonely, quirky, and adrift. And the plot is a lighthearted, touching blend of life, love, introspection, friendship, self-depreciating humour, awkward situations, sweet moments, dating woes, misunderstandings, intimacy, and moving on.

Overall, Good Material is a layered, astute, clever tale by Alderton that is the first novel I’ve read by this author, but certainly won’t be my last.

 

This novel is available now.

Pick up a copy from your favourite retailer or from one of the following links.

        

 

 

Thank you to Penguin Random House Canada for gifting me a copy in exchange for an honest review.

 

About Dolly Alderton

DOLLY ALDERTON is an award-winning author, screenwriter and journalist based in London. She is a columnist for The Sunday Times Style and has also written for GQ, Red, Marie Claire and Grazia. She is the former co-host and co-creator of the podcast The High Low. Her first book, Everything I Know About Love, became a top five Sunday Times best-seller in its first week of publication, won a National Book Award (UK) for Autobiography of the Year and was made into a BBC One TV Series. Ghosts, her first novel, was published in 2021. Dear Dolly, a collection of her agony aunt columns from the Sunday Times Style magazine, was published in 2022 and was also a Sunday Times best-seller.

Photo by Alexandra Cameron.

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#BookReview The Other Valley by Scott Alexander Howard @SimonSchusterCA #TheOtherValley #ScottAlexanderHoward #SimonSchusterCA

categories: 8.5/10, Book Review, Fantasy, General Fiction, Science Fiction
#BookReview The Other Valley by Scott Alexander Howard @SimonSchusterCA #TheOtherValley #ScottAlexanderHoward #SimonSchusterCA Title: The Other Valley

Author: Scott Alexander Howard

Published by: Scribner on Feb. 27, 2024

Genres: Fantasy, General Fiction, Science Fiction

Pages: 304

Format: ARC, Paperback

Source: Simon & Schuster Canada

Book Rating: 8.5/10

A literary speculative novel about an isolated town neighbored by its own past and future

Sixteen-year-old Odile is an awkward, quiet girl vying for a coveted seat on the Conseil. If she earns the position, she’ll decide who may cross her town’s heavily guarded borders. On the other side, it’s the same valley, the same town–except to the east, the town is twenty years ahead in time. To the west, it’s twenty years behind. The towns repeat in an endless sequence across the wilderness.

When Odile recognizes two visitors she wasn’t supposed to see, she realizes that the parents of her friend Edme have been escorted across the border from the future, on a mourning tour, to view their son while he’s still alive in Odile’s present. Edme––who is brilliant, funny, and the only person to truly see Odile––is about to die. Sworn to secrecy in order to preserve the timeline, Odile now becomes the Conseil’s top candidate, yet she finds herself drawing closer to the doomed boy, imperiling her entire future.

Review:

Intricate, unique, and thought-provoking!

The Other Valley is a clever, absorbing tale that takes you into the life of Odile, a young girl who has her life turned upside down when she accidentally glimpses people visiting from the east who are living twenty years in the future, one of her close friends suddenly dies, she destroys her chances of becoming a member of the influential Conseil, and she must decide whether she will risk her life to go twenty years in the past and enter the duplicate valley to the west to alter the one tragedy that changed so many lives forever.

The prose is raw and expressive. The characters are vulnerable, conflicted, and inured. And the plot is a mysterious, immersive tale of life, love, loss, family, friendship, self-identity, power, security, control, duty, desperation, and magical realism.

Overall, The Other Valley is a gripping, pensive, speculative story by Howard that did a beautiful job of incorporating a creative storyline, what-if fiction, and an atmospheric setting into a compelling coming-of-age tale full of reflection, friendship, and first love.

 

This book is available now.

Pick up a copy from your favourite retailer or from one of the following links.

        

 

 

Thank you to Simon & Schuster Canada for gifting me a copy in exchange for an honest review.

 

About Scott Alexander Howard

Scott Alexander Howard lives in Vancouver, British Columbia. He has a PhD in philosophy from the University of Toronto and was a postdoctoral fellow at Harvard, where his work focused on the relationship between memory, emotion, and literature. The Other Valley is his first novel.

Photograph by Veronica Bonderud

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#BookReview Batshit Seven by Sheung-King @PenguinRandomCA #SheungKing #BatshitSeven #PenguinReads

categories: 8/10, Book Review, General Fiction
#BookReview Batshit Seven by Sheung-King @PenguinRandomCA #SheungKing #BatshitSeven #PenguinReads Title: Batshit Seven

Author: Sheung-King

Published by: Penguin Canada on Feb. 20, 2024

Genres: General Fiction

Pages: 336

Format: ARC, Paperback

Source: Penguin Random House Canada

Book Rating: 8/10

From Governor General’s Award-nominated author Sheung-King comes a novel about a millennial living through the Hong Kong protests, as he struggles to make sense of modern life and the parts of himself that just won’t gel.

Glen Wu (aka Glue) couldn’t care less about his job. He’s returned to Hong Kong, the city he grew up in, and he’s teaching ESL, just to placate his parents. But he shows up hungover to class, barely stays awake, and prefers to spend his time smoking up until dawn breaks.
 
As he watches the city he loves fall—the protests, the brutal arrests—life continues around him. So he drinks more, picks more fights with his drug dealer friend, thinks loftier thoughts about the post-colonial condition and Frantz Fanon. The very little he does care his sister, who deals with Hong Kong’s demise by getting engaged to a rich immigration consultant; his on-and-off-again relationship with a woman who steals things from him; and memories of someone he once met in Canada….
 
When the government tightens its grip, language starts to lose all meaning for Glue, and he finds himself pulled into an unsettling venture, ultimately culminating in an act of violence.
 
Inventive and utterly irresistible, with QR codes woven throughout, Sheung-King’s ingenious novel encapsulates the anxieties and apathies of the millennial experience. Batshit Seven is an ode to a beloved city, an indictment of the cycles of imperialism, and a reminder of the beautiful things left under the hype of commodified living.

Review:

Insightful, candid, and immersive!

Bathsit Seven is a unique, colourful tale that takes us into the life of Glen “Glue” Wu, a young man who, after spending a few years attending university in Canada, returns to a politically tense Hong Kong where he finds himself in a serious rut spending his days drinking, getting high, spending the occasional time with platonic friends as well as those with benefits, masturbating, lackadaisically teaching ESL remotely, and contemplating what he wants out of life and where he actually fits into the world.

The writing is creative and direct. The characters are lonely, impulsive, and insecure. And the plot, told through narration and a scattering of QR Codes, is an engaging, perceptive tale about life, friendship, family, culture, politics, orientalism, racism, and self-identity.

Overall, Batshit Seven is a captivating, well-written, astute tale by Sheung-King that highlights the true struggles of coming of age in a contemporary world that seems to increasingly be more overwhelming, judgemental, and stressful.

 

This novel is available now.

Pick up a copy from your favourite retailer or from one of the following links.

        

 

 

Thank you to Penguin Random House Canada for gifting me a copy in exchange for an honest review.

 

About Sheung-King

SHEUNG-KING’s debut novel, You Are Eating an Orange. You Are Naked., was a finalist for the 2021 Governor General's Literary Award for Fiction and the 2021 Amazon Canada First Novel Award. It was longlisted for Canada Reads 2021 and named one of the best book debuts by The Globe and Mail. Sheung-King taught creative writing at the University of Guelph, where he received his MFA. He divides his time between Canada and China.

Photo by Maari Sugawara.

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