Publisher: Viking
Released: 2nd of February 2023
DO YOU FEEL NOTHING? OR DO YOU FEEL EVERYTHING?
It all began at a wedding. A smile across the room. A moment of lust. A separation long overdue. Then a woman sat down . . . and never stood up again.
Suddenly hundreds, then thousands of people are sitting down. Is it a sickness - or are they simply giving up?
In the search for love, or happiness, or anything at all, is living a choice? Or is it just something that happens to us?
TW: Death, mental illness, medical content, suicidal thoughts, drug abuse
What I Have to Say
This is not a book to read when you're depressed, but I really enjoyed it. It was a really interesting look at how the world views mental illness and how it would view a mass suicide pandemic in a fictional scenario. I was disappointed at how quickly the world wrote it off as a choice, but I think that's a reflection on the world itself really.
I really liked the characters and seeing how they each reacted to the situation. I would have really liked to see a bit more from the journalist character, seeing as she brought us into the book. I also thought that it would be really interesting to see the conflict between reporting on this, especially as there was the question of whether people were being influenced by seeing reports of others sitting down. But the author drifted away from her story and started to look at other characters instead. I liked the other characters and I especially liked the LGBTQ+ representation, but I would have liked to see more of that thread of the story.
The ending really hit me hard. I saw it coming, especially as the author started to build up to it, but that didn't make it any less hard hitting. I would like to see more of what happened after, but I do think that was the right place to end.
All in all, my advice is to only read this when you're in a good place but it is well worth the read.
4 stars
My thanks go to Netgalley and Penguin for providing me with this copy for review.
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