Review: This Time Tomorrow

This Time Tomorrow, by Emma Staub (Riverhead 2022)

First line: “Time did not exist in the hospital.”

Ever since I read All Adults Here mid-2020, I’ve been enamored with Emma Staub’s writing. She takes vast casts of characters, that — while not always likeable — she manages to make utterly relatable no matter the circumstances. Her novels center around relationships, and her writing just flows right off the page in a way that is easy to digest while still being interesting. In This Time Tomorrow, those things are definitely still true, though she adds in a magical realism element, as main character Alice finds herself returning to the morning of her 16th birthday, where her dad is no longer dying in a hospital bed and her future is inevitably changed by the choices she makes over the course of these 24 hours.

Like I said, a lot of what I love about Straub can be found here, although I’m starting to wonder if time travel novels are one of those things that I think I will love, but really don’t work that well for me (see: Oona Out of Order. Maybe it’s something about the enneagram 6 of me, that I already play through every scenario’s outcomes enough in my head that I don’t actually enjoy reading about that sort of thing). There’s something that gets repetitive about it, as the character tries to figure out the logistics of their circumstances that gets a little tedious. However, Straub did give us the benefit of rushing through several iterations within just a paragraph or two, so it didn’t bog me down much. And while I did find myself missing the more ensemble nature of many of Straub’s books that I’ve read, I found Alice to be a wonderful main character and loved her relationship with her father and her best friend. There’s a lot of heart in this book and lots of good fodder for conversation and reflection. I just didn’t find myself adoring it quite as much as I’d hoped to.

Review: Shark Heart

Shark Heart: A Love Story, by Emily Habeck (Marysue Rucci Books 2023)

First line: “In the early days after I left New York, I would ruminate, doubt all my choices. But when I met you, I began to thank my failure. Maybe failing was a kind of miracle. Maybe everything happened just right.”

After not putting this in my BOTM box in August, I was feeling major FOMO, and so when Crystal @readingthroughbookclub announced it as September’s pick, I went for it, and I am so glad I did!

Despite this one being all over the internet the last couple months, so many readers are advocating for going into this one blind, and I have to say, I wish I hadn’t actually read the synopsis beforehand too, so I’m not going to share it here. Know that this is the story of a marriage, a story of mothers and daughters, and a story of terminal illness — with a hefty dose of wtf did I just read? But what I will talk about is my reading experience. As I mentioned in my recent review of Calling for a Blanket Dance, I am a sucker for an interesting format. Shark Heart comes through in spades in that respect. In addition to the micro chapters that most of the book is comprised of, many sections are written as play scripts, as Lewis is a theater teacher at the high school where he works. There are also occasionally lists that read almost like poetry — and in fact, much of Habeck’s prose reads like poetry. Her writing is incredibly lyrical throughout, without being pretentious or stuffy. The shortness of the chapters kept the pages moving, which, honestly thank goodness, because a lot of the content is extremely heavy.

Though I had a few qualms with it, I tore through this one and loved my time among the gorgeous language. Well worth the handful of days it took to read, and I loved getting to chat about it last night with my booksta pals!