Christina

There's a rare but delightful category of great books - something like ‘Books I wouldn't necessarily want to read based on the premise, but can't put down once I start' - and Tomorrow, and Tomorrow, and Tomorrow falls squarely into it. I was inspired to read this book about 1% based on its description, 99% based on rave reviews from people I trust; I don't have much to add to their effusive commentary other than to say the hype is JUSTIFIED. I was utterly invested in the three characters, I was engrossed by the plot, and I even managed to grow curious about video games - something I genuinely never thought I'd say. I found this book fascinating, heartrending, and heartwarming, and I'll be purchasing a hard copy when it's published - this is a book that warrants at least one reread, and I can't wait to lend it out.

Thanks to NetGalley and Knopf for my ARC.

GRRR. This book was so frustrating to me, because for the first two-thirds, it was unquestionably a five-star read. The way it all concluded, though - WHY. WHY WHY WHY. Especially in a world in which it's immediately established on that magic exists - one character gets flashes of sentiment and stories whenever he touches an item someone else has touched first, another can hear and interpret heartbeats - why wouldn't you take a creative, compelling approach to resolution over a ‘grounded' ending that defies belief?!

Normally, I tolerate just-OK plots so long as the writing is good. The writing here is gorgeous, if occasionally overwrought - dark, moody, dreamlike, building a sense of dread that reminded me of Rumaan Alam's Leave the World Behind. But the plot felt like such an afterthought, I just couldn't get past it. Without getting too specific (but stop reading if you want to be 100% unspoiled!), the control mechanism the plot rests on was not compelling (and frankly borderline cliche), and the epilogue section glazed over a key plot point (like, OK, everyone in the entire community just accepted this world-shattering information and unconcernedly went on with their lives? no questions, pushback, anger? it's just...all good?). I felt like the author knew in broad strokes where she wanted to go but didn't think deeply enough about how to get there.

I LOVED this book. Couldn't put it down, couldn't stop dog-earing, couldn't stop texting friends with snapshots of paragraphs and !!!!s kind of love.

Win Me Something follows Willa Chen - half Chinese, half white - through a formative year-ish of nannying for a wealthy white family in Manhattan and reckoning with her own muddled childhood. In the author's words, from the very first page:

“I had parents. I had siblings. I had homes, multiple or zero, depending on how you looked at it. I wasn't unloved, not uncared for, exactly. It was cloudier than that, ink spreading into water as I tried to claim the words. If you're undercared for, but essentially fine, what do you do with all that hurt, the kind that runs through your tendons and tugs on your muscles but doesn't show up on your skin?”

WHEW.

Throughout the (debut!) novel, Willa grapples with this pervasive feeling of not belonging, of feeling tolerated but never actively wanted, of squeezing herself in to the margins of other people's lives. (The way Lucia Wu writes this is fresh and resonant and haunting; the prose is stellar.) I was so compelled by her journey as she starts to name and explore and question these beliefs.

Strongly, strongly recommend.