A Brief History of Living Forever by Jaroslav Kalfar

Pages: 320 

Publisher: Hodder and Stoughton 

Released: 28th of March 2023 

Set in a near-future America under the dual manipulations of technology and surveillance, A Brief History of Living Forever tells the epic, exhilarating story of a long-lost brother and sister on a mission to reclaim their mother from oblivion.

 

When Adela discovers she has a terminal illness, her thoughts turn to Tereza, the American-raised daughter she gave up at birth. Leaving behind her moody, grown son, Roman, in their native Czech village, she flies to the United States to find the long-lost daughter who never knew her. Yet the country, in the year 2029, is steeped in surveillance and has adopted an unapologetic nationalism—a very different place from the open and accepting one Adela experienced decades earlier, when, as a teenager high on the promise of America, she eloped with a filmmaker and starred in his cult sci-fi movie.

 

Now, in New York City, with time running out, Adela reunites with Tereza, who is working as the star researcher for two suspicious biotech moguls hellbent on developing a “god pill” to extend human life indefinitely. But before Tereza can find a cure for Adela, her mother dies mysteriously. Unbeknownst to Tereza, her body is whisked away by the American government to a mass grave for undocumented immigrants in the swampy wastelands of what was once Florida. Distraught, Tereza travels to the Czech Republic to convince Roman, the brother she’s never met, to join her in rescuing their mother’s remains from oblivion, with the intent of bringing her home to rest in Czech soil.

 

Narrated from the beyond by Adela, A Brief History of Living Forever is a high-wire act of storytelling that demonstrates once more Jaroslav Kalfar’s endless powers of invention. By turns insightful, moving, and funny, the novel blends an immigrant mother’s heartbreaking journey through the American dream with her children’s quest to reclaim her from a country that would erase any record of her existence. Above all, it is a reminder that neither space nor time can sever our connection to the ones we love.

What I Have to Say 

This book was so depressing. I didn't dislike it, I actually really liked some parts of it. But man, it was a grim look at what our future can be. 

I  really liked Adela a lot. She had an interesting perspective on things and she was honestly a really lovable character to get to know. It was really interesting seeing her narrative considering the things that happen in the book. I also really liked parts of her back story. The bits where they were filming the newt movie were really entertaining to read, not least of all because it was a really bizarre concept for a film. 

The ending was just really really grim and quite frankly terrifying. It really made me think about where the world is going right now and I really really do not want it to end up like this book. 

Overall, I enjoyed the book somewhat, but it really depressed me. 

3 stars 

My thanks go to Netgalley and Hodder and Stoughton for providing me with this copy for review. 

Are You Happy Now by Hannah Jameson

Pages: 352 

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. 

The Valkyrie by Kate Heartfield

Pages: 314 

Publisher: Harper Voyager 

Released: 30th of March 2023 

Brynhild is a Valkyrie: shieldmaiden of the All-Father, chooser of the slain. But now she too has fallen, flightless in her exile.

Gudrun is a princess of Burgundy, a daughter of the Rhine, a prize for an invading king – a king whose brother Attila has other plans, and a dragon to call upon.

And in the songs to be sung, there is another hero: Sigurd, a warrior with a sword sharper than the new moon.

As the legends tell, these names are destined to be rivals, fated as enemies. But here on Midgard, legends can be lies…

For not all heroes are heroic, nor all monsters monstrous. And a shieldmaiden may yet find that love is the greatest weapon of all.

From Sunday Times bestselling author Kate Heartfield comes a glorious, lyrical retelling of one of Norse mythology’s greatest epics.

What I Have to Say 

This was a good story but I found that I couldn't connect to the characters or the plot at all. Normally when I read, I feel like I'm in the head of the characters and seeing the action through their eyes, but for some reason with this one, I just didn't connect this way. I tried and tried to work out the reason why, but I honestly don't have one. This book just didn't hit home. 

I loved the author's version of the myth, probably a lot more than I'd have liked the original myth. She changed a lot to give Brynhild more agency and then to make it more gay, which is always an improvement. I loved the magic that Gudrun had as well. It was a really interesting way of doing magic. 

The ending felt a bit off though. It made sense that she set up loads of threads to make the story bigger. But it kind of felt like she got to the end of the myth and then panicked because the book was too short and so put in extra stuff to make it longer. It just didn't feel so connected to the original myth. 

If you're interested in Norse Mythology it might be worth a read. 

Like a Curse by Elle McNicholl

Pages: 320 

Publisher: Knights Of 

Released: 2nd of February 2023 

Stuck in Loch Ness while Edinburgh falls under the control of a terrifyingly powerful Siren, Ramya Knox is frustrated. She's supposed to be learning magic from her Aunt Opal, but that isn't going as smoothly as she'd hoped. As she pushes to rescue her Hidden Folk friends in the city, long-buried secrets come to light and legends come to life.

Ramya knows she's different; she knows she's a witch. But now she must learn the true meaning of her powers... before all she loves is lost

What I Have to Say 

I loved everything about this book, except for the ending. It was everything I've come to expect from Elle McNicholl. Brave, bold neurodiverse characters, interesting and unexpected plots and for this series all sorts of exciting mythical creatures!! But the ending just let it down completely. I understand why it ended this way from the perspective of things that Ramya needed to learn. But I just don't think it's the right ending for a book of this genre. 

I was so excited to be near Lock Ness! Lock Ness means one thing. The Lock Ness monster. And if you're reading a book about hidden creatures and it's set near Lock Ness then obviously it has to be the Lock Ness Monster, even if all the characters say it doesn't exist. I won't say much about what kind of creature it is, but I will see that I was very happy. 

As always, I loved Elle McNicoll's characters and how neurodiverse they were. I am very happy to see myself represented in these books for my autism and dyspraxia. It means so much to me to see these things. 

4 stars 

My thanks go to Netgalley and Knights Of as well as Ed Pr for providing me with this copy for review. 

White Cat, Black Dog by Kelly Link

Pages: 272 

Publisher: Head of Zeus 

Released: 28th of March 2023 

Seven ingeniously reinvented fairy tales that play out with astonishing consequences in the modern world, from one of today's finest short story writers - MacArthur 'Genius Grant' Fellow Kelly Link, bestselling author of the Pulitzer Prize finalist Get in Trouble.

Finding seeds of inspiration in the Brothers Grimm, seventeenth-century French lore, and Scottish ballads, Kelly Link spins classic fairy tales into utterly original stories of seekers - characters on the hunt for love, connection, revenge, or their own sense of purpose.

In 'The White Cat's Divorce', an aging billionaire sends his three sons on a series of absurd goose chases to decide which will become his heir. In 'The Girl Who Did Not Know Fear', a professor with a delicate health condition becomes stranded for days in an airport hotel after a conference, desperate to get home to her wife and young daughter, and in acute danger of being late for an appointment that cannot be missed. In 'Skinder's Veil', a young man agrees to take over a remote house-sitting gig for a friend. But what should be a chance to focus on his long-avoided dissertation instead becomes a wildly unexpected journey, as the house seems to be a portal for otherworldly travelers - or perhaps a door into his own mysterious psyche.

Twisting and winding in astonishing ways, expertly blending realism and the speculative, witty, empathetic, and never predictable - these stories remind us once again of why Kelly Link is incomparable in the art of short fiction.

What I Have to Say 

This is it. This is the weird and slightly disturbing short story collection that's going to haunt me until the end of my days. So this was a mixed bag. The writing wasn't great. There was a lot of stuff that wasn't needed in the stories and honestly some of the stories bored me completely, probably because they were trying to say something that I didn't get. But I enjoyed some of them and the last story Skinder's Veil, I am obsessed with. 

Skinder's Veil is about a PHD student who goes to housesit for someone to get away from his annoying roommate. I didn't need to know all the stuff about how the roommate had so much sex and that his girlfriend was haunted by a ghost. That all bogged down the story. It could have easily been summed up in a couple of lines. But the actual bits in the house and the descriptions of the visitors and the magic of it all completely captivated me. I've been thinking about it since I read it and I definitely want to read it again some time. 

The rest of the book, I will not revisit. I enjoyed some of the stories well enough, but not enough to read again. but the weirdness of it all and that last story is gonna be something that I think I'm gonna remember for a long time. 

3 stars 

My thanks goes to Netgalley and Head of Zeus for providing me with this copy for review. 

 

This Is How You Fall In Love by Anika Hussain

Pages: 352 

Publisher: Hot Key Books 

Released: 2nd of February 2023 

Zara and Adnan are just friends. Always have been, always will be. Even if they have to pretend to be girlfriend and boyfriend...

Zara loves love in all forms: 90s romcoms and romance novels and grand sweeping gestures. And she's desperate to have her own great love story. Crucially, a real one. So when her best friend Adnan begs her to pretend to date him to cover up his new top-secret relationship, Zara is hesitant. This isn't the kind of thing she had in mind. But there's something in it for Zara too: making her parents, who love Adnan, happy might just stop them arguing for a while. She may not be getting her own love story, but she could save theirs.

So Zara agrees and the act begins: after all, how different can pretending to be in a relationship with your best friend be to just hanging around with them like usual? Turns out, a lot. With fake dating comes fake hand-holding and fake kissing and real feelings... And when a new boy turns up in Zara's life, things get more confusing than ever.

The course of true love never did run smooth, but Zara's love story is messier than most...

What I Have to Say 

This book was a love letter to love. Romantic love, platonic love, friendship and family, it leaves no kind of love out. The ending really touched me a lot with how positive it was a about friendships and familial love. 

It amused me a lot that she met the new boy playing Pokemon Go. As a Pokemon Go player myself I really appreciated the references, but I'm not sure if it would be too technical for people who don't play. It really endeared me towards Yahya though. I really liked him a lot. 

I do feel though that it was maybe a bit predictable because of which characters were fleshed out and which weren't. Although I was fearful that she would get together with the wrong boy at the end, I kind of felt like I knew how it would end. 

I really, really enjoyed it though and I hope you do too. 

4 stars 

My thanks go to Netgalley and Hot Key Books for providing this copy for review. 

The Sinister Booksellers of Bath by Garth Nix

Pages: 416 

Publisher: Gollancz 

Released: 23rd of March 2023 

There is often trouble of a mythical sort in Bath. The booksellers who police the Old World keep a careful watch there, particularly on the entity who inhabits the ancient hot spring. Yet this time it is not from Sulis Minerva that trouble starts. It comes from the discovery of a sorcerous map, leading left-handed bookseller Merlin into great danger. A desperate rescue is attempted by his sister the right-handed bookseller Vivien and their friend, art student Susan Arkshaw, who is still struggling to deal with her own recently discovered magical heritage.

The map takes the trio to a place separated from this world, maintained by deadly sorcery performed by an ancient sovereign and guarded by monstrous living statues of Portland Stone. But this is only the beginning, as the booksellers investigate centuries of disappearances and deaths and try to unravel the secrets of the murderous Lady of Stone, a serial killer of awesome powers.

If they do not stop her, she will soon kill again. And this time, her target is not an ordinary mortal.

What I Have to Say 

I'm really enjoying this series. The characters are fantastic, the story has enough twists an turns to make the ending unexpected without making it seem too far out and it has wonderful pop culture references that make the 80s setting pop with life. 

Merlin is a fantastic character. His quirky fashion sense, unpredictability and hints and gender fluidity come together to form a character who I very quickly came to love. Along with Susan and Vivien, he fends off threats that come after them. 

Parts of this book took place in Bath, as you can tell from the title and it really did well to show off the wonderful bits of a city I love. I loved reading about bits of the city I knew, though it left me desperately craving Sally Lunn's buns! 

If you haven't started this series yet, I would really recommend you do so ASAP! 

4 stars 

My thanks go to Gollancz and Netgalley for providing me with this copy for review.