JESS JUST READS

A BOOK REVIEW BLOG

She is Haunted by Paige Clark

A mother cuts her daughter’s hair because her own starts falling out. A woman leaves her boyfriend because he reminds her of a corpse; another undergoes brain surgery to try to live more comfortably in higher temperatures. A widow physically transforms into her husband so that she does not have to grieve.

In She Is Haunted, these renditions of the author search for recognition and connection, and, more than anything else, small moments of empathy. But in what world will she move beyond her haunted past and find compassion for herself?

With piercing insights into transnational Asian identity, intergenerational trauma and grief, the dynamics of mother-daughter relationships, the inexplicable oddities of female friendship, and the love of a good dog, Paige Clark has crafted an exquisite, moving and sophisticated debut work of fiction.

Paige Clark’s She is Haunted is a collection of eighteen short stories, each grappling with issues of recognition and connection, as well as loneliness and intimacy. Other themes peppered throughout the book include identity, grief, intergenerational trauma, sickness and hurt.

My favourite stories are Elisabeth Kubler-Ross, Gwendolyn Wakes, In A Room of Chinese Women, A Woman in Love, Why My Hair is Long, She is Haunted, and Snow Angels.

“I know lots of things now that I’m dead. Peter from Apartment Two has a spastic bladder. My former boss Morgan keeps her toenails in a gold jewellery box. My brother and his wife are trying for a baby. I always excuse myself before things get too heated. I don’t know much about my mother yet. I am waiting for grief to catch her, but she mostly seems ashamed-of her body, of what it made.”

Strengths lie in Paige’s ability to evoke instant imagery, with piercing prose and sharp dialogue. There are moments of humour in some of the stories, as well as irony and wit.

Stories vary in length, but all are self-contained. With females taking centre-stage across most of the book, each story in She is Haunted grapples with multiple themes and tones and will resonate with readers of all ages. Many of the stories offer insights into intergenerational trauma and Asian heritage. Each story possesses an element of strength and capability, but together, the collection is a really incredible piece of writing. Naturally, some stories won’t resonate with every reader but that’s the beauty of a collection — it’s about finding the ones you love most amongst a suite of impeccable work.

“Every morning I wake up, put on his robe and his slippers and shuffle to the bathroom. In the mirror, I hope to see his face instead of mine. I try to erase the woman I find with cakes makeup and waterproof mascara. She is relentless.”

Readers will be able to relate to elements within each story, and perhaps a reader’s favourite story will give insight into what kind of person they are. Short stories allow us to glimpse into the most compelling moment of a much wider journey, and will often leave us with much to ponder. Familial dynamic has a strong presence in the collection, particularly mother-daughter relationships, the connection between romantic partners, and also female friendship.

“Gwendolyn scanned the screen. She had an eagle eye for errors. The numbers were all in the low eighties at least. There was a ninety-six. And two ninety-twos. She reached out and put her hand to Forrest’s upper back. She couldn’t recall the last time she had touched someone who wasn’t her mother.”

Evocative, electric and moving, She is Haunted is Paige’s debut and will please seasoned readers, and those who love short stories and literary works. Readership skews female, 25+

Thank you to the publisher for sending me a review copy in exchange for an honest review.

She is Haunted
Paige Clark
July 2021
Allen & Unwin Book Publishers

The Rabbits by Sophie Overett

Winner of the 2020 Penguin Literary Prize.

How do you make sense of the loss of those you love most?

Delia Rabbit has asked herself this question over and over again since the disappearance of her older sister, Bo. Crippled by grief, Delia and her mother became dysfunctional, parting ways not long after Delia turned eighteen.

Now an art teacher at a Queensland college, Delia has managed to build a new life for herself and to create a family of her own. Only more and more that life is slipping: her partner, Ed, has gone, her daughter, Olive, is distancing herself, and, all of a sudden, in the middle of a blinding heatwave, her sixteen-year-old son, Charlie, disappears too.

Suddenly what was buried feels close to the surface, and the Rabbits are faced not only with each other, but also with themselves.

Sophie Overett’s The Rabbits is a multigenerational literary novel interwoven with magical realism. At its core, The Rabbits explores family and loneliness, a loss of connection among loved ones, and reconnecting during times of heartache.

Set over a relative short time period, the story follows the Rabbit family — mother Delia, ex-partner Ed, and their three children Olive, Charlie and Benjamin. One day, Charlie disappears. For Delia, it brings back the painful memories of her childhood when her sister Bo died.

“They’re there within the hour, the blue and red lights flashing through the gap in the curtains, and Olive peers cautiously out her window as two police officers step out of the car…it’s not long before she hears the front door crack open and the police officers step inside, hears their quiet, considered words to Delia, and Delia’s harried response.”

Set in suburban Brisbane, Sophie captures the layers of contemporary family life in Queensland. It’s not just about the steamy, humid weather or school or trauma, it’s about the tense relationship between mother and daughter, the fractured relationship between mother and father, and how when Charlie goes missing, they all slowly come together to process this new family dynamic.

There’s a certain poignancy to this novel — a sensitive caress. This story is more character-driven than plot-driven, and Sophie uses magical realism to peel back the layers of the Rabbits so they can begin to heal. There’s beauty in the unknown here, and going into this novel with no knowledge of how the magical realism will be embedded proves an interesting read indeed. I loved finding out how the story was going to progress, and how elements of the magical were going to be interwoven. Whilst the elements of the unreal are never really explained or resolved, I don’t think they need to be. There’s beauty in what’s left unsaid.

“Her voice is weedy, wiry, like it’s distorted through a line somehow, and Olive can’t help it — the way it drips like petrol into the constant embers of her anger. Her chest suddenly aches, and she wishes she was somewhere else.”

Written in third person, the chapters alternate POV between the different members of the Rabbit family, and sometimes it was a little unclear at first whose story we were in. It could take a minute to determine the transfer of perspective, especially if the scene involved more than one Rabbit.

Other than that, Sophie’s writing is near faultless and the story grips you from the opening chapters. Her writing is seamless and the dialogue realistic. Tender moments between siblings and friends help carry the story forward, and I think this novel will attract a broad audience.

“Delia’s pencil makes quick work on the tracing paper, righting the slant, the scale, the shading that angles the lurching gum trees so strangely. It’s an easy practice. The shadow of an old habit, and out of the corner of her eye she can see the girl watching with wide eyes, her cheeks flushed, her throat quivering in embarrassment or admiration, Delia doesn’t really care to know.”

Captivating, rich and beautifully written, The Rabbits is recommended for literary readers. Readership skews female, 25+

Thank you to the publisher for sending me a review copy in exchange for an honest review.

The Rabbits
Sophie Overett
July 2021
Penguin Random House Publishers

She’s On The Money by Victoria Devine

Through her phenomenally popular and award-winning podcast, She’s on the Money,Victoria Devine has built an empowered and supportive community of women finding their way to financial freedom.

Honest, relatable, non-judgemental and motivating, Victoria is a financial adviser who knows what millennial life is really like and where we can get stuck with money stuff. (Did someone say ‘Afterpay’…?) So, to help you hit your money goals without skimping on brunch, she’s put all her expert advice into this accessible guide that will set you up for a healthy and happy future.

Learn how to be more secure, independent and informed with your money – with clear steps on how to budget, clear debts, build savings, start investing, buy property and much more. And along with all the practical information, Victoria will guide you through the sometimes-tricky psychology surrounding money so you can establish the values, habits and confidence that will help you build your wealth long-term.

Just like the podcast, the book is full of real-life money stories from members of the She’s on the Money community who candidly share their experiences, wins and lessons learned to inspire others to turn their stories around, too. And with templates and activities throughout, plus a twelve-month plan to get you started, you can immediately put Victoria’s recommendations into action in your own life.

Victoria Devine’s financial self-help book She’s On the Money will help all readers on their journey to save more, invest more, and put their money towards realistic, achievable goals.

Victoria Devine is an Australian financial advisor and company founder. She’s the creator of the finance podcast of the same name, and prides herself on passing along reliable, helpful financial advise to young women. I haven’t read Barefoot Investor so impossible to know how it stands up — some reviews have noted the similarities. I also haven’t listened to Victoria’s podcast, which some people say has the same information as this book.

“If you want to create a structure for sustainable saving, start by tweaking small things instead of taking an all-or-nothing approach. Be reasonable and be aware. Before you go out to dinner or take a tour through the city or head off on a road trip think about what you’re going to spend.”

The writing style is accessible and accepting, so young women who haven’t had many successes saving money won’t feel shamed when reading this.

Readers will get value out of certain aspects of the book, and it’s entirely dependent on where they are in their life. I’m really quite savvy at saving money, and I don’t possess an interest in shares or investing, but my interests definitely lie in learning the how-tos of buying property and what I need to be aware of before purchasing property. Young readers who haven’t been able to save money but can’t work out why will find this book especially helpful.

“Look, credit cards aren’t bad. It’s just that people are bad with credit cards. And it’s okay that we aren’t super amazing in every aspect of our lives. I just think we need to be realistic about which financial products are enabling us. What things are making us stray from our values and goals?”

There are certain elements of the book that I’m not sure are as useful — I’ve never been one to fill out any interactive element or activity in a book, and this book has a lot of them. But hey, perhaps that works for some people.

“I hear a lot of excuses for why people can’t save, but the notion that they don’t earn a high enough wage is the one I want to debunk first. Saying that you’ll start saving when you earn more money is like saying you’ll start going to the gym once you’re skinny and fit.”

Recommended for readers wanting to understand their financials better. This is a pretty clear-cut book — either you’ll want to read it or you won’t. But know there’s a lot of information in here worth learning. Readership skews female, 16+

Thank you to the publisher for sending me a review copy in exchange for an honest review.

She’s On The Money
Victoria Devine
June 2021
Penguin Random House Publishers

The Others by Mark Brandi

On his eleventh birthday, Jacob’s father gives him a diary. To write about things that happen. About what he and his father do on their farm. About the sheep, the crop, the fox and the dam. But Jacob knows some things should not be written down. Some things should not be remembered.

The only things he knows for sure are what his father has taught him. Sheltered, protected, isolated. But who is his father protecting him from? And how far will his father go to keep the world at bay?

All too soon, Jacob will learn that, sometimes, people do the most terrible things.

Firmly establishing himself as a master of crime and thriller, Mark Brandi’s latest novel The Others is another haunting tale.

Set on remote farmland and largely written in diary form, The Others follows an 11-year-old boy as he documents his day-to-day interactions with his overly protective but secretive father. Just who are the others he keeps talking about? And is Jacob actually in any real danger?

“So I have to stay home, and I have to stay in my room. It’s just in case the others come. I don’t mind staying home so much, because it gives me time to do my own things. Sometimes, I hear gunshots from somewhere in the bush. It must be a long way away, because it takes a long time for sound to travel.”

The Others reminds me a little of Room by Emma Donoghue. We only get snippets of the truth because we’re experiencing everything through the mind of an innocent child. Jacob looks to his father as protector, however his father is anything but.

As the reader, you know that Jacob is being fed lies and you witness him start to realise that his beloved parental figure might not be entirely truthful. It’s about following the story as the tension builds, pacing increases and you wonder how the tale is going to unfold.

Strengths lie in Jacob’s voice – he’s young and innocent, and quite naïve. But he’s not annoying or frustrating as a narrator. He is both insightful and present within his surroundings. His childlike voice offered a new perspective to Brandi’s novels, which haven’t yet delved into this kind of protagonist yet. It felt like something unique to his repertoire, and fans of his work will appreciate the pivot.

“He cooked it good this time. He always cooks the meat and I do the porridge. That’s the deal. He served it up and it was nicer, with the crispy bits, and the meat cooked right through.”

I did find that the book ended with a lot of unanswered questions, particularly around the women out hiking. The woman seemed to know Jacob’s father, so I’m not sure why he felt so threatened by her. And it perhaps felt a little unrealistic that the woman managed to find Jacob’s cabin so easily, when later in the novel we are told just how incredibly remote and difficult to discover it actually is?

And was Jacob’s mother actually sick? Jacob’s memory seemed to imply she was bedridden for a long time, but the revelation at the end seems to contradict that. Perhaps there was a bit of scope to reveal some of that information, particularly during those short sections where we’re with Jacob when he’s an adult.

Also, when is this novel set? It’s not necessary to know this, but talks of sickness and plague and illness made me think this was all fictional, but another reviewer interpreted this novel to be set post-COVID.

“The soft eyes are worse than when he gets angry. They hang around like the fog. Like the fog on the hill in winter. That’s what it’s like. But when he gets angry, even if the whites of his eyes scare me, it passes pretty quick.”

Overall a really entertaining novel and very quick to read – more pages than paragraphs, it felt. I ripped through this in one afternoon and really enjoyed it. The Others is engaging and atmospheric, and recommended for readers of crime, thriller and mystery. Readership skews 25+

Thank you to the publisher for mailing me a review copy in exchange for an honest review.

The Others
Mark Brandi
July 2021
Hachette Book Publishers

The Husbands by Chandler Baker

Welcome to the neighbourhood. We do things differently here.

Recently, Nora has started to feel that ‘having it all’ – a family, a soon-to-be new house, a successful career in law – comes with a price, one her husband doesn’t seem to be paying quite so heavily. She loves Hayden, but why is it that, however hard men work, their wives always seem to work that much harder?

Then her house-hunting takes them to an affluent suburban neighbourhood and Nora’s eyes are opened to a new world. One where women can have it all. One where the men actually pull their weight.

But a wrongful death case involving one of the local residents draws Nora further into this perfect world and she begins to realise that the secret of ‘having it all’ is far more complicated than she could ever have imagined. In fact, it may be worth killing for…

Feminist thriller The Husbands is Chandler Baker’s second novel, this time set in an affluent suburban community in Austin Texas, where the residents aren’t as they seem and protagonist Nora gets sucked into solving a strange house fire.

The Husbands is very reminiscent of Stepford Wives, where behaviour doesn’t quite have an explanation and each domestic relationship holds countless secrets. The Husbands imagines an environment where husbands pull their weight and responsibility is shared equally — an environment I’m sure many female readers wish existed.

“But he looked so sad. It was her fault — she’d been the one to go and marry an extrovert. And he’d really wanted to have one with Liv, only Nora had never gotten around to planning it. And anyway, he promised, promised, that they weren’t those kinds of parents.”

Strengths lie in the pacing and build-up of tension, drip-feeding clues to the reader and enticing us to keep flicking to the next chapter. The Husbands will please fans of thrillers and mysteries.

The characterisation of Nora will resonate with the reader, as Chandler does well to capture her frazzled, frustrated state of mind. She’s fed up and at the end of her tether, and Chandler captures moments of tension between Nora and her husband with relatable dialogue and scenes.

“Nora finds much of the explanation has flown over her head: Maybe she has one of those interrupted neural pathways. Science always makes her feel like a dimwit. But she makes an encouraging noise as they continue to walk and talk through the next corridor, where closed doors line either side.”

The premise of the novel isn’t anything new, nor is Nora’s character arc. A determined career woman trying to juggle a career and a family, with very little help from her dopey husband, feels like quite a common plot. But the mystery surrounding the Dynasty Ranch neighbourhood and the strange house fire that killed a man does add another layer to it that separates it from the rest of the genre.

I do wish the revelations at the end — in particular, the backstory provided by Cornelia — was less of an info dump. Cornelia’s truth would’ve been more interesting to discover had Nora stumbled upon some of it herself, instead of Cornelia just blurting it all out at the end of the book like a horror movie.

“Nora and Francine linger a moment longer, sizing one another up. Nora tries to sort through what her role here is, attempts to calculate which would be worse, to tell Cornelia and Asher or not to.”

Clever and twisty, The Husbands is recommended for readers of contemporary fiction and thriller — part murder mystery part domestic psychological thriller. Readership skews female, 30+

Thank you to the publisher for sending me a review copy in exchange for an honest review.

The Husbands
Chandler Baker
July 2021
Hachette Book Publishers