GIRL DINNER by Olivie Blake
I picked GIRL DINNER from my upcoming NetGalley arcs.
This is my first experience with Blake and I was absolutely surprised.
GIRL DINNER is about two women and in the beginning you’re not really sure how they’re connected but as the story takes place all of that is explained.
Sloane is a newer mother who has found herself in the passenger seat of the car of her life. She’s not sure she can still call herself a true feminist as in her life and in her marriage and relationships she takes on a more traditional role.
Not a Trad Wife or really a housewife she struggles to see herself when she looks in the mirror. She is learning for her what makes a “good woman” and what makes a “good mother” and a “good wife.” She feels she is ultimately failing at being the role model she wants for her daughter.
Nina is our other point of view and she is rushing a sorority. She is dealing with a specific form of racism, the lack of finding herself amongst her peers and might have just landed herself in some kind of cult.
While reading GIRL DINNER I laughed. I felt seen. I wanted to meet a few women at dawn on the bridge with a stick of matches. Ultimately, I was hungry.
It made me think of the status quo and all the ways I have bound myself by my own ideas of what a woman should be, could be and do.
I appreciated the conversation about bad feminism and know better now what to expect from Blake.
What a gift!
Thanks to NetGalley and Macmillan Audio for the advanced copy!
I gave Girl Dinner four stars! I really enjoyed it.
GIRL DINNER comes out in October.
Children are missing, and Isla can’t go a day without thinking of the ones she’s lost. The perfect whirlwind of events, so when a strange boy walks upon her in the garden, she assumes he is a miracle.
She instantly knows the only thing to do is to keep him safe, and soon her family fosters the boy they have named Rowan.
Rowan is unlike most boys. Raised by strangers who had no concern for his safety and well-being. Wherever he came from, Isla is set on being his family now.
Days into staying with them, mysterious things start to occur. Is Rowan just an ordinary boy? Is he just what the family needed? Or will he be a test of faith?
The work of angels and demons are miracles and tests of faith.
THE UNSEEN by Ania Ahlborn is an exploration of grief and why the darkness we see in others resides within ourselves. It is a conversation about faith and what it means to believe in THE UNSEEN.
The plot, the characters, and the writing are all top-notch. I had such a good time reading that I know I will explore Ahlborn’s backlist later this fall.
Have you read Ania Ahlborn before?
Thanks to NetGalley and Gallery Books for the advanced copy!
In What Hunger, we follow Veronica. We meet up with her in the early days of summer. In the beginning, everything is as it should be. By the end, Veronica will be unrecognizable. Something happens this summer that will change her life forever.
In the aftermath, within grief, she transforms from someone to something. No longer meant to be prey, she becomes the hunter. The metamorphosis is striking, especially to Veronica.
We follow along as she adjusts to her new self, this new hunger, this new way of feeding herself.
WHAT HUNGER is for me, about growth, change, and metamorphosis. What does it mean when those who are closest to you imagine you a certain way that you have inevitably outgrown? It’s about grieving the death of the many prior versions of yourself.
The caterpillar becomes the butterfly.
Thanks to Netgalley and Simon & Schuster for the advanced copy!
