#BookReview Here One Moment by Liane Moriarty @doubledayca @PenguinRandomCA #HereOneMoment #LianeMoriarty #PenguinReads

#BookReview Here One Moment by Liane Moriarty @doubledayca @PenguinRandomCA #HereOneMoment #LianeMoriarty #PenguinReads Title: Here One Moment

Author: Liane Moriarty

Published by: Doubleday Canada on Sep. 10, 2024

Genres: Mystery/Thriller

Pages: 512

Format: Hardcover

Source: Penguin Random House Canada

Book Rating: 10/10

If you knew your future, would you try to fight fate?

Aside from a delay, there will be no problems. The flight will be smooth, it will land safely. Everyone who gets on the plane will get off. But almost all of them will be forever changed.
 
Because on this ordinary, short, domestic flight, something extraordinary happens. People learn how and when they are going to die. For some, their deaths are far in the future—age 103!—and they laugh. But for six passengers, their predicted deaths are not far away at all.
 
How do they know this? There were ostensibly more interesting people on the flight (the bride and groom, the jittery, possibly famous woman, the giant Hemsworth-esque guy who looks like an off-duty superhero, the frazzled, gorgeous flight attendant) but none would become as famous as “The Death Lady.”
 
Not a single passenger or crew member will later recall noticing her board the plane. She wasn’t exceptionally old or young, rude or polite. She wasn’t drunk or nervous or pregnant. Her appearance and demeanor were unremarkable. But what she did on that flight was truly remarkable.
 
A few months later, one passenger dies exactly as she predicted. Then two more passengers die—again, as she said they would. Soon no one is thinking this is simply an entertaining story at a cocktail party.
 
If you were told you only had a certain amount of time left to live, would you do things differently? Would you try to dodge your destiny?
 
Liane Moriarty’s Here One Moment is a brilliantly constructed tale that looks at free will and destiny, grief and love, and the endless struggle to maintain certainty and control in an uncertain world. A modern-day Jane Austen who humorously skewers social mores while spinning a web of mystery, Moriarty asks profound questions in her newest I-can’t-wait-to-find-out-what-happens novel.


Review:

Intricate, thought-provoking, and immersive!

Here One Moment is a pensive, moving, emotionally-charged novel that takes you into the lives of a handful of people whose worlds are irrevocably changed and linked by one plane ride and a woman who feels the need to tell every passenger the age and manner in which they will die.

The prose is eloquent and intense. The characters, including all the supporting characters, are complex, conflicted, and genuine. And the plot is a compelling, sobering tale of life, love, loss, family, friendship, grief, guilt, acceptance, fate, consequences, and choices.

Overall, Here One Moment will make you think and will resonate with you long after the final page. It’s an impactful, enthralling, reflective tale by Moriarty that does a remarkable job of highlighting humanities weaknesses and emotional fragility and reminds us just how important it is to appreciate all those little things in life, the moments, the sunsets, and the shared smiles.

 

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 Liane Moriarty

Liane Moriarty is the author of the #1 New York Times bestsellers Big Little Lies, The Husband’s Secret, and Truly Madly Guilty; the New York Times bestsellers Nine Perfect Strangers, What Alice Forgot, and The Last Anniversary; The Hypnotist’s Love Story; and Three Wishes. She lives in Sydney, Australia, with her husband and two children.

Photo by über photography

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

#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 Funny Story by Emily Henry @PenguinRandomCA #EmilyHenry #FunnyStory #PenguinReads

#BookReview Funny Story by Emily Henry @PenguinRandomCA #EmilyHenry #FunnyStory #PenguinReads Title: Funny Story

Author: Emily Henry

Published by: Berkley on Apr. 23, 2024

Genres: Contemporary Romance

Pages: 400

Format: Hardcover

Source: Penguin Random House Canada

Book Rating: 9/10

A shimmering, joyful new novel about a pair of opposites with the wrong thing in common.

Daphne always loved the way her fiancé Peter told their story. How they met (on a blustery day), fell in love (over an errant hat), and moved back to his lakeside hometown to begin their life together. He really was good at telling it…right up until the moment he realized he was actually in love with his childhood best friend Petra.

Which is how Daphne begins her new story: Stranded in beautiful Waning Bay, Michigan, without friends or family but with a dream job as a children’s librarian (that barely pays the bills), and proposing to be roommates with the only person who could possibly understand her predicament: Petra’s ex, Miles Nowak.

Scruffy and chaotic—with a penchant for taking solace in the sounds of heart break love ballads—Miles is exactly the opposite of practical, buttoned up Daphne, whose coworkers know so little about her they have a running bet that she’s either FBI or in witness protection. The roommates mainly avoid one another, until one day, while drowning their sorrows, they form a tenuous friendship and a plan. If said plan also involves posting deliberately misleading photos of their summer adventures together, well, who could blame them?

But it’s all just for show, of course, because there’s no way Daphne would actually start her new chapter by falling in love with her ex-fiancé’s new fiancée’s ex…right?


Review:

Amusing, smart, and adorably romantic!

Funny Story is an engaging, witty, roommates-to-more romance that features the quiet, wary Daphne and the outgoing, charming Miles as together they navigate their heartbreak and discover that their exes leaving them might be the best thing that ever happened to them.

The writing is sweet and crisp. The characters are quirky, charismatic, and genuine. And the plot is an irresistible blend of life, love, friendship, family, flirting, light drama, tricky situations, spirited shenanigans, awkward moments, and delectable romance.

I’ve always been a fan of Emily Henry novels, and Funny Story has just become another favourite. It’s funny, tender, deliciously swoon-worthy and without a doubt, one of the best rom-coms I’ve had the pleasure to read this year.

 

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 Emily Henry

Emily Henry is the #1 New York Times bestselling author of People We Meet on Vacation and Beach Read. She studied creative writing at Hope College, and now spends most of her time in Cincinnati, Ohio, and the part of Kentucky just beneath it.

Photo by Devyn Glista/St. Blanc Studios.

#BookReview Collide by Bal Khabra @authorbalkhabra @PenguinRandomCA #BalKhabra #Collide #OffTheIceSeries #PenguinReads

#BookReview Collide by Bal Khabra @authorbalkhabra @PenguinRandomCA #BalKhabra #Collide #OffTheIceSeries #PenguinReads Title: Collide

Author: Bal Khabra

Series: Off the Ice #1

Published by: Berkley on May 14, 2024

Genres: Contemporary Romance

Pages: 416

Format: ARC, Paperback

Source: Penguin Random House Canada

Book Rating: 8/10

An ultimatum from her professor thrusts Summer Preston into an unexpected collision with hockey captain Aiden Crawford. She’s caught in a delicate balance between fulfilling her lifelong dream of becoming a sport psychologist and veering far away from this god-awful sport.

For Aiden Crawford, being the captain of the college hockey team has its perks, except when a reckless mistake by his team threatens to jeopardize their entire season. Consequently, his coach nominates him as the subject of a research paper. It’s the last thing he wants to do, especially since the girl leading the project looks like she could wield his skates as a weapon.

Summer can’t stand his blasé approach to life, and Aiden doesn’t understand her uptight, scheduled one. They are off to a rocky start, and provoking each other is what they do best, but defeat isn’t something either of them is willing to accept.


Review:

Sporty, sexy, and satisfying!

Collide is a passionate, sweet tale featuring the intelligent, feisty Summer who is more than happy to use a hockey player as a subject for her research paper but is more than confident that she would never date one, and the responsible, hunky Aidan who will do whatever it takes to get his team to the playoffs even if it means working off their escapades by helping out a girl that drives him absolutely crazy but is infuriatingly pretty.

The writing is light and crisp. The characters are charismatic, kind, and fun-loving. And the plot is the perfect blend of drama, emotion, humour, heat, witty banter, chemistry, friendship, family, romance, and hockey.

Overall, I found Collide to be a charming, steamy, entertaining start to this new Off the Ice series by Khabra that, as a true fan of the sports romance genre, has left me excited and definitely eager for more.

 

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 Bal Khabra

Bal Khabra is a Canadian writer and book lover. Before she decided to jump into the romance pool, she spent her time gushing about books on social media. When inspiration strikes, she is found filling her notes app with ideas for romance novels. She loves reading about love, watching movies about love, and now, writing about it herself. There really isn’t much else that gets her heart fluttering the way HEAs do. She fell in love with writing and hopes to continue living out her romance author dreams.

#BookReview The Night in Question by Susan Fletcher @sfletcherauthor @PenguinRandomCA #SusanFletcher #TheNightInQuestion #PenguinReads

#BookReview The Night in Question by Susan Fletcher @sfletcherauthor @PenguinRandomCA #SusanFletcher #TheNightInQuestion #PenguinReads Title: The Night in Question

Author: Susan Fletcher

Published by: Doubleday Canada on Apr. 2, 2024

Genres: Mystery/Thriller

Pages: 440

Format: ARC, Paperback

Source: Penguin Random House Canada

Book Rating: 8.5/10

A lyrical and emotionally engaging novel infused with mystery and wisdom about love, friendship, and the power of forgiveness.

Florrie Butterfield—eighty-seven, one-legged, and of cheerful disposition—believes there can’t be any more adventures or surprises in life to experience. Yet one midsummer’s evening, there’s an accident at Babbington Hall—the adult residence where she lives—so shocking and strange that Florrie is suspicious; is this really an accident? Or is she being lied to? Is she, in fact, living alongside a potential murderer? In her efforts to learn the truth, Florrie is forced to look back on her own life, with all its passions and regrets; she must confront her own bloody secret—and, at last, forgive herself. Above all, Florrie learns, through the help of her new friend, Stanhope, that you’re never too old to have the life you’ve always dreamed of. When it comes to love, it’s never too late.

Readers of moving fiction about late-in-life second chances such as Fredrik Backman’s A Man Called Ove and Rachel Joyce’s The Unlikely Pilgrimage of Harold Fry will love this un-putdownable book.


Review:

Poignant, satisfying, and mysterious!

The Night in Question is a charming, tender tale that takes you into the life of eighty-seven-year-old Florrie Butterfield, a feisty resident of Babbington Hall who, after witnessing the facility’s young manager fall from a third-floor window, takes it upon herself to recruit another fellow resident to help her prove that it was not an attempted suicide after all but rather a more sinister plan that had actually been in the works for a very long time.

The writing style is sentimental and heartfelt. The characters are quirky, determined, and intriguing. And the plot is a well-paced, compelling whodunit full of red herrings, amateur sleuthing, tricky situations, awkward moments, troubled pasts, deduction, danger, and vengeance.

Overall, The Night in Question is a cosy, satisfying, entertaining read by Fletcher that was such a delight to read with all its intricacies, drama, and endearing characters.

 

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 Susan Fletcher

SUSAN FLETCHER is a British novelist. Her debut, Eve Green, won the 2004 Whitbread First Novel Award, the Betty Trask Prize, the Author’s Club Best First Novel Award and the Richard and Judy Summer Read in 2005. It was also shortlisted for the LA Times First Novel Award. Her other novels include Oystercatchers (longlisted for the Romantic Novel of the Year Award and the Dylan Thomas Prize), Witch Light (shortlisted for the John Llewellyn-Rhys Award and the Writer’s Guild Best Fiction Award) and A Little In Love (winner of 2016 North East Children's Book Award). Susan is the current Fellow at the University of Worcester as part of the Royal Literary Fund's fellowship scheme. She lives in Stratford-Upon-Avon, England.

#BookReview The Gathering by C.J. Tudor @cjtudor @PenguinRandomCA #CJTudor #TheGathering #PenguinReads

#BookReview The Gathering by C.J. Tudor @cjtudor @PenguinRandomCA #CJTudor #TheGathering #PenguinReads Title: The Gathering

Author: C.J. Tudor

Published by: Doubleday Canada on Apr. 9, 2024

Genres: Mystery/Thriller

Pages: 352

Format: ARC, Paperback

Source: Penguin Random House Canada

Book Rating: 8.5/10

A detective investigating a grisly crime in rural Alaska finds herself caught up in the dark secrets and superstitions of a small town in this riveting novel from the acclaimed author of The Chalk Man

Deadhart, Alaska. 873. Living.

In a small Alaska town, a boy is found with his throat ripped out and all the blood drained from his body. The inhabitants of Deadhart haven’t seen a killing like this in twenty-five years. But they know who’s responsible: a member of the Colony, an ostracized community of vampyrs living in an old mine settlement deep in the woods.

Detective Barbara Atkins, a specialist in vampyr killings, is called in to officially determine if this is a Colony killing—and authorize a cull. Old suspicions die hard in a town like Deadhart, but Barbara isn’t so sure. Determined to find the truth, she enlists the help of a former Deadhart sheriff, Jenson Tucker, whose investigation into the previous murder almost cost him his life. Since then, Tucker has become a recluse. But he knows the Colony better than almost anyone.

As the pair delve into the town’s history, they uncover secrets darker than they could have imagined. And then another body is found. While the snow thickens and the nights grow longer, a killer stalks Deadhart, and two disparate communities circle each other for blood. Time is running out for Atkins and Tucker to find the truth: Are they hunting a bloodthirsty monster . . . or a twisted psychopath? And which is more dangerous?


Review:

Unique, mysterious, and atmospheric!

The Gathering is a gritty, unsettling tale that takes you to Deadhart, Alaska, a small town that has lived a relatively quiet existence for the past twenty-five years since the Colony moved away after the death of a local boy. But now the Colony is back, and another young boy has suddenly been found with his throat ripped out, and the townspeople are no longer interested in finding the one person or thing responsible, they’re out for blood and won’t be happy until the whole Colony of vampyrs are slaughtered once and for all.

The writing is sharp and descriptive. The characters are meticulous, intelligent, and driven. And the plot unfolds and unravels quickly into a suspenseful, action-packed tale full of twists, turns, manipulation, deception, community, surprises, suspects, hostility, savagery, deduction, desperation, complex relationships, violence, murder, and the supernatural.

Overall, The Gathering is a clever, tight, disturbing thrill ride that had just the right amount of twists, turns, and surprises to keep me thoroughly engrossed from start to finish. It’s surprisingly the first novel I’ve read by Tudor, but I can guarantee you it 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 C.J. Tudor

C. J. Tudor is the author of The Drift, The Burning Girls, The Other People, The Hiding Place, and The Chalk Man, which won the International Thriller Writers Award for Best First Novel, the Barry Award, and the Strand Critics Award for Best Debut Novel. Over the years she has worked as a copywriter, television presenter, voice-over artist, and dog walker. She is now thrilled to be able to write full-time, and doesn’t miss chasing wet dogs through muddy fields all that much. She lives in England with her partner and daughter.

Photo: © Bill Waters

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

#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

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

#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.

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

#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.

#BookReview The Cure for Drowning by Loghan Paylor @PenguinRandomCA #LoghanPaylor #TheCureForDrowning #PenguinReads

#BookReview The Cure for Drowning by Loghan Paylor @PenguinRandomCA #LoghanPaylor #TheCureForDrowning #PenguinReads Title: The Cure for Drowning

Author: Loghan Paylor

Published by: Random House Canada on Jan. 30, 2024

Genres: Historical Fiction, LGBTQIA

Pages: 400

Format: ARC, Paperback

Source: Penguin Random House Canada

Book Rating: 8.5/10

Evocative, magical and luminously written, The Cure for Drowning is not only a brilliant, boundary-pushing love story but a Canadian historical novel that boldly centres queer and non-binary characters in unprecedented ways.

Born Kathleen to an immigrant Irish farming family in southern Ontario, Kit McNair has been a troublesome changeling since, at ten, they fell through the river ice and drowned—only to be nursed back to life by their mother’s Celtic magic. A daredevil in boy’s clothes, Kit chafes at every aspect of a farmgirl’s life, driving that same mother to distraction with worry about where Kit will ever fit in. When Rebekah Kromer, an elegant German-Canadian doctor’s daughter, moves to town with her parents in April 1939, Rebekah has no doubt as to who 19-year-old Kit is. Soon she and Kit, and Kit’s older brother, Landon, are drawn tight in a love triangle that will tear them and their families apart, and send each of them off on a separate path to war. 

Landon signs up for the Navy. Kit, now known as Christopher, joins the Royal Air Force, becoming a bomber navigator relied on for his luck and courage. Rebekah serves with naval intelligence in Halifax, until one more collision with Landon changes the course of her life and draws her back to the McNair farm—a place where she’d once known love. Fallen on even harder times, the McNairs welcome all the help she is able to give, and she believes she has found peace at last. Until, with the war over, Kit and Landon return home.

Told in the vivid, unforgettable voices of Kit and Rebekah, The Cure for Drowning is a powerfully engrossing novel that imagines a history that is truer than true.


Review:

Tempestuous, tender, and immersive!

The Cure for Drowning is a fresh, absorbing tale set in Southern Ontario during the early 1940s that takes us into the lives of three main characters. Kit, a young adventurous spirit who finds the love of their life in the daughter of the new local doctor; Landon, Kit’s older brother who is confident and charming and someone who follows his head more than his heart; and Rebekah, a young woman who feels torn between what society deems is appropriate and the feelings she has for both of the McNair siblings.

The writing is passionate and moving. The characters are hopeful, hesitant, and endearing. And the plot is an engaging, touching tale about life, loss, friendship, family, hope, heartbreak, tragedy, destiny, sexual identity, gender fluidity, fate, war, and enduring love.

Overall, The Cure for Drowning is a captivating, well-written, richly described debut by Paylor that highlights that love comes in many forms and is a beautiful reminder that to love and be loved is one of humanity’s most fundamental needs that transcends gender, sex, race, religion, and socioeconomics.

 

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 Loghan Paylor

LOGHAN PAYLOR is a queer, trans author who lives in Abbotsford, British Columbia. Their short fiction and essays have previously appeared in Room and Prairie Fire, among others. Paylor has a Master's in creative writing from the University of British Columbia, and a day job as a professional geek. The Cure for Drowning is their first novel.

Photo by Michael Paylor.