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A Good Happy Girl
A poignant, surprising, and immersive read about a young professional woman pursuing an emotionally intense relationship with a married lesbian couple.
Helen, a jittery attorney with a self-destructive streak, is secretly reeling from a disturbing crime of neglect that her parents recently committed. Historically happy to compartmentalize— distracting herself by hooking up with lesbian couples, doting on her grandmother, and flirting with a young administrative assistant—Helen finally meets her match with Catherine and Katrina, a married couple who startle and intrigue her with their ever-increasing sexual and emotional intensity.
Perceptive and attentive, Catherine and Katrina prod at Helen’s life, revealing a childhood tragedy she’s been repressing. When her father begs her yet again for help getting parole, she realizes that she has a bargaining chip to get answers to her past.
In her exploration of queer domesticity, effects of incarceration on family, and intergenerational poverty, Marissa Higgins offers empathy to characters who don’t often receive it, with unsettling results.
Helen, a jittery attorney with a self-destructive streak, is secretly reeling from a disturbing crime of neglect that her parents recently committed. Historically happy to compartmentalize— distracting herself by hooking up with lesbian couples, doting on her grandmother, and flirting with a young administrative assistant—Helen finally meets her match with Catherine and Katrina, a married couple who startle and intrigue her with their ever-increasing sexual and emotional intensity.
Perceptive and attentive, Catherine and Katrina prod at Helen’s life, revealing a childhood tragedy she’s been repressing. When her father begs her yet again for help getting parole, she realizes that she has a bargaining chip to get answers to her past.
In her exploration of queer domesticity, effects of incarceration on family, and intergenerational poverty, Marissa Higgins offers empathy to characters who don’t often receive it, with unsettling results.
256 pages, Hardcover
First published April 2, 2024
194 people are currently reading
18306 people want to read
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May 29, 2024
Fair warning to reviewers that this author goes to the Sarah Stusek School of Authorship and Reader Interaction. If you review her work, it may be taken personally, and you may be used for content.
UPDATE 2: I literally cannot believe I still have to talk about this book, and this is the last time I’m willing to come back to it. I’m floored by this author and her childish behavior.
Although I have not tried to engage with this author in any degree beyond posting this review, and quite frankly I would very much like to never think about her or her book again, she has continued. At this point, what I and others wrote has been referred to as “hate” and this author has doubled down on her shit. In my eyes, this is a well-thought-out review in which I broke down all of the reasons I did not like this book and went to the trouble of providing specific examples to back up my thoughts. I also mentioned what I did like and what I thought worked, and I am absolutely perplexed as to how a book review that points out what didn’t work about your book for someone is “hate.” If legitimate criticism such as “extremely purple prose” and “really cool setups that get ruined by heavy exposition” with provided examples from your work to back it up is too much heat for you due to a snarky tone, I literally do not know what to tell you.
I disliked Marissa Higgins’ book. I did not give a fuck about Marissa Higgins until she decided she wanted to mess with me—regardless of her intention, and regardless of her censoring my profile, I have indeed received flying monkey messages from a couple of people who seem to follow her. It’s not that hard to find the literal top negative review of your book, but at least I'm a mudscamp, not someone with identifying information on their account. Just because a review is negative does not mean it is hateful, or directed specifically at you as a person as opposed to your writing, and even if it was, does that really mean that you should be responding to reviews? This level of defensiveness and attitude is entirely antithetical to improvement in all possible ways. There’s a reason you don’t see other authors doing this with their criticism all the time: because it’s ridiculous.
Bottom line: Not taking reviews personally is the first rule of literally any public career in which you can be reviewed, and honestly? The fact that she reacts like this to criticism explains more about the book than I initially thought. I cannot imagine working with this author as an editor if she goes nuclear every time someone doesn’t kiss her ass.
This author has some serious growing up to do, and I am done revisiting this.
ORIGINAL UPDATE: In coming back to edit this review for clarity about ten hours after posting, I found I had a couple people reaching out to me to let me know this review was screenshotted and posted on the author's Instagram story (Yet another update to add that this was not a personal account or some kind of close friends story, which I would have zero gripes with, it's her author Instagram with links to her professional website and advertisement of her work in the bio. It is private only in that she's manually approving followers. My review was also posted in a TikTok on her completely public account, which I did not initially know), presumably in a negative light. I have no idea what was said on Instagram and cannot provide comment or personally confirm this, but my profile was at least not included in the TikTok. However, I have no problem asserting that it is generally a massive no-no to respond to reviews, both positive and negative, as an author. It's cool to privately think my review is stupid and wrong; I really don't mind. I am frequently both stupid and wrong, as are most human beings. (I also have no problem saying I removed a few sentences that felt excessive in that they may have come off as personal vs. about the writing, which was not the intention. I'm not perfect.) Roast me with your friends all you want; screenshotting a review and flaming it in the groupchat is also cool. It's going public that's inappropriate.
Regardless, I don't personally think I'm wrong about this book, and my opinion has not changed. I still think this is a very bad book that was not ready for publication, and I still do not understand the trend of using your negative feedback as publicity. Publicly, directly responding to reviews serves no purpose but making yourself look bad and pissing off PR. Trawling new reviews two months after publication and having such a strong and immediate reaction to negativity assures me in my initial assessment. This was a very immature and unprofessional response to what was intended as legitimate, though admittedly facetious, criticism. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
REVIEW: This is a huge rant review and I’m about to be mean. TLDR; My reaction can be boiled down to “What the hell was that supposed to be and who thought it was ready to be published?”
I love litfic. I love litfic about gross women. I love litfic about unconventional queer relationships. I love litfic about severe/‘unusual’ trauma. This book is trying to be all of those things, but it did none of them well, and mostly just succeeded in making me want to throw it, or possibly drown it until it said it was sorry? Unfortunately, I could not do this because the library would make me pay for it.
A Good Happy Girl is a terrible, horrible, no good, very bad day addition to the world of gross/unhinged woman litfic. It wants to be just weird and sloppy and shocking. It doesn’t want to bother to be good and have a point. Personally, I’m used to being proved wrong by low average ratings, but this is a book that made me immediately understand why the GR average is somewhere in the 3.2’s.
Some people are saying the prose is interesting, stylistic, in some ways pretentious but in a way that feels grounded and works with the protagonist, very enjoyable, gritty, different. I say these people are big liars! This is weak writing with no idea what it wants to be. And I would love to provide you with some examples of just how “great” the writing is:
I’m not sure it’s possible to phrase this in a more confusing, convoluted, pretentious way, despite the sentiment behind the word salad being interesting. The entire book is written with this strangely disorganized so-purple-it-hurts prose, and I was sick of paying such close attention/trying to parse this author's style by probably 20%.
THROAT.
???? I like weird writing. I do not like this weird writing.
Even when there were good moments, the author would sabotage them with this really weird authorial trait. She tends to do all this cool subtle character work and then immediately ruin it by tacking a blunt explanation of the point/all the nuance she just laid out onto the end. Because god forbid you trust your readers with subtext.
Or just flat out exposition of things we’ve covered about 4,000 times already:
There were plenty of other places where we learned why Helen doesn’t like herself. We see her think of herself this way and we see why others perceive her this way as well. All this unsubtle reinforcement was unnecessary; I really wish the author would have just let her prose breathe a little.
Here is what I imagine happened in editing this book: everyone involved was tunnel-visioned on ‘oh god this is awful but this HAS to work out and be a good idea because we’re this far into the process’, and instead of putting in the massive amount of effort you would need to fix this thing, I think that the same paragraphs were frantically reworked and rephrased over and over again, and then that was taken as proof that it therefore must have improved, hence why half of this reads like the author beat her keyboard with a thesaurus. What I think actually needed to happen was full rewrites vs. rephrases, complete overhauls of the side characters, and a total restructuring. I genuinely don’t see a way of saving this the way it’s presented.
This book is an unpleasant character study, somehow both over and underwritten, shallow as hell, and self-indulgent without any right to be (Although it at least manages to be grammatically correct I guess?). It’s not stylistic, it’s just annoying. It’s like it was written by an edgy teenager who needed to hit a word count for their creative writing class. How it got to the point where I assume all of the above happened? I have no idea. Literary agents will give a book deal to anything EXCEPT a good manuscript I swear to god. It makes me sad to think about what may have been passed over in favor of this, and I’m terrified of what this stupid book looked like BEFORE it was edited for publication. (Also, I’m not sure of the last time a book made me angry enough to not feel even a little bit bad about saying any of these things.)
The sex was unattractive to the point of being legitimately disgusting. I’m sure (I hope; I’m pretty sure this wasn’t intended to be erotic) that’s part of the point (if you want to perform the mental gymnastics necessary to believe this book had a point), but I still think it was quite strange to do things like switching back and forth between incredibly medical terms (vaginal canal, perineum, vaginal fluid, are you horny yet?) and the colloquials a real human being would use in the moment. It wasn’t good weird sex; it was an inability to write weird sex without throwing in a bunch of distracting oddball nonsense.
There was not one instance of sex without clinical language contrasting with shit and piss kinks, references to Helen’s feet and shoving them in someone’s face, unbelievably awkward interactions and descriptions of things like fixing someone’s posture, etc. None of them have any chemistry whatsoever, all the secondary and tertiary characters blend into blobs of zero personality, and the degree to which Helen’s gross intrusive thoughts come up (roughly once per sentence, and always things like ‘I wonder what would happen if I pissed my pants right now’) is just so exhausting. I like the portrayal of how pervasive and strange these thoughts can be, but even Ottessa Moshfegh books have moments of clarity, outside perspective on the characters, and moments without the hyper-narration of the protagonist’s depravity/inside world or whatever. Meanwhile, this book is just one big intrusive thought. Which is actually a cool idea! But the way it was written was obnoxious to read. It got old fast:
Just FYI she’s talking about cough syrup :)))). Also, this book does not earn lines like "What is a symptom if not a compulsion the mind cannot resist", but it sure is full of them! There's some literary value and truth to that sentence, sure, but it's so painfully pretentious in context with everything around it that it just made me laugh instead of think. We can’t get through so much as Helen washing her hands without an interjection:
And can we talk about the scene where Catherine takes Helen into the closet and does extremely unclear things with Helen’s feet that are so vaguely written I couldn’t figure out why any of it was happening or how I was supposed to feel about it or if it was meant to be in any way attractive or representative of something on the literary level?? (I know Helen was confused too, but I just…I can’t do this.) Then they just…left the closet and went to continue talking with Catherine’s wife? WHAT WAS THAT????? I literally thought Catherine was about to murder her or throw her down into a secret basement. At no point did I have any concept of what was happening. Comically bad. Easily deserving of the Bad Sex in Fiction award regardless of how seriously I’m meant to be taking it.
Oh, and not to mention the repeated mentions of everyone being bloated/having bloated stomachs. Obviously it’s fine to be bloated, and Helen being bloated I get, but why is everyone in this world bloated all the time? What is causing the bloating? Are they all full of gas? Food? Pregnant? Is it just Helen projecting/being into the idea that everyone is bloated for some reason? Tie-in to the mommy issues? Who knows! Just another strange little thing.
Basically, you can write weird gross-girl observations and sex without it being…whatever this was. As much as I would love to keep complaining about this book forever, I’ll just say that I really wish this had worked. This is the exact kind of book I always want to read more of, and in many ways this subverted tropes of the genre (loved that Helen wasn’t turning to men as is standard; love mommy issues fiction). The setup was interesting, the story with the parents, the dead brother, and the elder abuse was fucked up and compelling until it just…fizzled out and went nowhere and none of it got explained or expanded on in even the slightest of terms. This could have been something, but the execution was tragic. I would spend more time digging into the plot, but it was so thin that’s literally all I have. There were interesting themes and I understand (I think?) where the author was trying to go with the buildup and the ending alike, but at the end of the day, it didn't work for me and hardly matters.
I will give exactly one point to this hilariously relatable thought spiral, and absolutely nothing else about this book:
Anyway. Do not read this; I cannot recommend against this book enough. I hate everyone who let this happen to a cool idea and I think I might hate myself a little for not DNF’ing even though I’ve never DNF’d in my life.
UPDATE 2: I literally cannot believe I still have to talk about this book, and this is the last time I’m willing to come back to it. I’m floored by this author and her childish behavior.
Although I have not tried to engage with this author in any degree beyond posting this review, and quite frankly I would very much like to never think about her or her book again, she has continued. At this point, what I and others wrote has been referred to as “hate” and this author has doubled down on her shit. In my eyes, this is a well-thought-out review in which I broke down all of the reasons I did not like this book and went to the trouble of providing specific examples to back up my thoughts. I also mentioned what I did like and what I thought worked, and I am absolutely perplexed as to how a book review that points out what didn’t work about your book for someone is “hate.” If legitimate criticism such as “extremely purple prose” and “really cool setups that get ruined by heavy exposition” with provided examples from your work to back it up is too much heat for you due to a snarky tone, I literally do not know what to tell you.
I disliked Marissa Higgins’ book. I did not give a fuck about Marissa Higgins until she decided she wanted to mess with me—regardless of her intention, and regardless of her censoring my profile, I have indeed received flying monkey messages from a couple of people who seem to follow her. It’s not that hard to find the literal top negative review of your book, but at least I'm a mudscamp, not someone with identifying information on their account. Just because a review is negative does not mean it is hateful, or directed specifically at you as a person as opposed to your writing, and even if it was, does that really mean that you should be responding to reviews? This level of defensiveness and attitude is entirely antithetical to improvement in all possible ways. There’s a reason you don’t see other authors doing this with their criticism all the time: because it’s ridiculous.
Bottom line: Not taking reviews personally is the first rule of literally any public career in which you can be reviewed, and honestly? The fact that she reacts like this to criticism explains more about the book than I initially thought. I cannot imagine working with this author as an editor if she goes nuclear every time someone doesn’t kiss her ass.
This author has some serious growing up to do, and I am done revisiting this.
ORIGINAL UPDATE: In coming back to edit this review for clarity about ten hours after posting, I found I had a couple people reaching out to me to let me know this review was screenshotted and posted on the author's Instagram story (Yet another update to add that this was not a personal account or some kind of close friends story, which I would have zero gripes with, it's her author Instagram with links to her professional website and advertisement of her work in the bio. It is private only in that she's manually approving followers. My review was also posted in a TikTok on her completely public account, which I did not initially know), presumably in a negative light. I have no idea what was said on Instagram and cannot provide comment or personally confirm this, but my profile was at least not included in the TikTok. However, I have no problem asserting that it is generally a massive no-no to respond to reviews, both positive and negative, as an author. It's cool to privately think my review is stupid and wrong; I really don't mind. I am frequently both stupid and wrong, as are most human beings. (I also have no problem saying I removed a few sentences that felt excessive in that they may have come off as personal vs. about the writing, which was not the intention. I'm not perfect.) Roast me with your friends all you want; screenshotting a review and flaming it in the groupchat is also cool. It's going public that's inappropriate.
Regardless, I don't personally think I'm wrong about this book, and my opinion has not changed. I still think this is a very bad book that was not ready for publication, and I still do not understand the trend of using your negative feedback as publicity. Publicly, directly responding to reviews serves no purpose but making yourself look bad and pissing off PR. Trawling new reviews two months after publication and having such a strong and immediate reaction to negativity assures me in my initial assessment. This was a very immature and unprofessional response to what was intended as legitimate, though admittedly facetious, criticism. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
REVIEW: This is a huge rant review and I’m about to be mean. TLDR; My reaction can be boiled down to “What the hell was that supposed to be and who thought it was ready to be published?”
I love litfic. I love litfic about gross women. I love litfic about unconventional queer relationships. I love litfic about severe/‘unusual’ trauma. This book is trying to be all of those things, but it did none of them well, and mostly just succeeded in making me want to throw it, or possibly drown it until it said it was sorry? Unfortunately, I could not do this because the library would make me pay for it.
A Good Happy Girl is a terrible, horrible, no good, very bad day addition to the world of gross/unhinged woman litfic. It wants to be just weird and sloppy and shocking. It doesn’t want to bother to be good and have a point. Personally, I’m used to being proved wrong by low average ratings, but this is a book that made me immediately understand why the GR average is somewhere in the 3.2’s.
Some people are saying the prose is interesting, stylistic, in some ways pretentious but in a way that feels grounded and works with the protagonist, very enjoyable, gritty, different. I say these people are big liars! This is weak writing with no idea what it wants to be. And I would love to provide you with some examples of just how “great” the writing is:
The jam was more tart than sweet, a mix of berries I could not identify. I could separate nothing into its original state: What did a blueberry taste like, a raspberry, a plum? If there were moments I had sat and contemplated the sweet juice of a solitary berry, my mind already replaced them with the haunt of a medley’s pleasure.
I’m not sure it’s possible to phrase this in a more confusing, convoluted, pretentious way, despite the sentiment behind the word salad being interesting. The entire book is written with this strangely disorganized so-purple-it-hurts prose, and I was sick of paying such close attention/trying to parse this author's style by probably 20%.
…as Emma sucked my breast into her throat, my eyes watered.
THROAT.
I thought, She wants me. Or she wanted me. My bladder felt warm and narrow.
???? I like weird writing. I do not like this weird writing.
Even when there were good moments, the author would sabotage them with this really weird authorial trait. She tends to do all this cool subtle character work and then immediately ruin it by tacking a blunt explanation of the point/all the nuance she just laid out onto the end. Because god forbid you trust your readers with subtext.
I wondered what it might feel like to sleep between the joints of her spine. Small and precarious, like my own life, but warmer, maybe. I have always been tempted by maybes.
If I couldn’t get Emma to love me by being sick, I figured I could get what I wanted by hurting her—I have always been a bad person.
Or just flat out exposition of things we’ve covered about 4,000 times already:
Hurting others has always been my preferred method of dealing with problems of my own making.
There were plenty of other places where we learned why Helen doesn’t like herself. We see her think of herself this way and we see why others perceive her this way as well. All this unsubtle reinforcement was unnecessary; I really wish the author would have just let her prose breathe a little.
Here is what I imagine happened in editing this book: everyone involved was tunnel-visioned on ‘oh god this is awful but this HAS to work out and be a good idea because we’re this far into the process’, and instead of putting in the massive amount of effort you would need to fix this thing, I think that the same paragraphs were frantically reworked and rephrased over and over again, and then that was taken as proof that it therefore must have improved, hence why half of this reads like the author beat her keyboard with a thesaurus. What I think actually needed to happen was full rewrites vs. rephrases, complete overhauls of the side characters, and a total restructuring. I genuinely don’t see a way of saving this the way it’s presented.
This book is an unpleasant character study, somehow both over and underwritten, shallow as hell, and self-indulgent without any right to be (Although it at least manages to be grammatically correct I guess?). It’s not stylistic, it’s just annoying. It’s like it was written by an edgy teenager who needed to hit a word count for their creative writing class. How it got to the point where I assume all of the above happened? I have no idea. Literary agents will give a book deal to anything EXCEPT a good manuscript I swear to god. It makes me sad to think about what may have been passed over in favor of this, and I’m terrified of what this stupid book looked like BEFORE it was edited for publication. (Also, I’m not sure of the last time a book made me angry enough to not feel even a little bit bad about saying any of these things.)
The sex was unattractive to the point of being legitimately disgusting. I’m sure (I hope; I’m pretty sure this wasn’t intended to be erotic) that’s part of the point (if you want to perform the mental gymnastics necessary to believe this book had a point), but I still think it was quite strange to do things like switching back and forth between incredibly medical terms (vaginal canal, perineum, vaginal fluid, are you horny yet?) and the colloquials a real human being would use in the moment. It wasn’t good weird sex; it was an inability to write weird sex without throwing in a bunch of distracting oddball nonsense.
There was not one instance of sex without clinical language contrasting with shit and piss kinks, references to Helen’s feet and shoving them in someone’s face, unbelievably awkward interactions and descriptions of things like fixing someone’s posture, etc. None of them have any chemistry whatsoever, all the secondary and tertiary characters blend into blobs of zero personality, and the degree to which Helen’s gross intrusive thoughts come up (roughly once per sentence, and always things like ‘I wonder what would happen if I pissed my pants right now’) is just so exhausting. I like the portrayal of how pervasive and strange these thoughts can be, but even Ottessa Moshfegh books have moments of clarity, outside perspective on the characters, and moments without the hyper-narration of the protagonist’s depravity/inside world or whatever. Meanwhile, this book is just one big intrusive thought. Which is actually a cool idea! But the way it was written was obnoxious to read. It got old fast:
I imagined the wives ordering me to pull onto the side of the road, removing their underwear, and taking turns pouring syrup into each other’s vaginal canals, letting me lap up the drippings. What is a symptom if not a compulsion the mind cannot resist.
Just FYI she’s talking about cough syrup :)))). Also, this book does not earn lines like "What is a symptom if not a compulsion the mind cannot resist", but it sure is full of them! There's some literary value and truth to that sentence, sure, but it's so painfully pretentious in context with everything around it that it just made me laugh instead of think. We can’t get through so much as Helen washing her hands without an interjection:
I rubbed the soap between my fingers. Red red red. I wondered what Emma might look like suckling my bones.
And can we talk about the scene where Catherine takes Helen into the closet and does extremely unclear things with Helen’s feet that are so vaguely written I couldn’t figure out why any of it was happening or how I was supposed to feel about it or if it was meant to be in any way attractive or representative of something on the literary level?? (I know Helen was confused too, but I just…I can’t do this.) Then they just…left the closet and went to continue talking with Catherine’s wife? WHAT WAS THAT????? I literally thought Catherine was about to murder her or throw her down into a secret basement. At no point did I have any concept of what was happening. Comically bad. Easily deserving of the Bad Sex in Fiction award regardless of how seriously I’m meant to be taking it.
Oh, and not to mention the repeated mentions of everyone being bloated/having bloated stomachs. Obviously it’s fine to be bloated, and Helen being bloated I get, but why is everyone in this world bloated all the time? What is causing the bloating? Are they all full of gas? Food? Pregnant? Is it just Helen projecting/being into the idea that everyone is bloated for some reason? Tie-in to the mommy issues? Who knows! Just another strange little thing.
Basically, you can write weird gross-girl observations and sex without it being…whatever this was. As much as I would love to keep complaining about this book forever, I’ll just say that I really wish this had worked. This is the exact kind of book I always want to read more of, and in many ways this subverted tropes of the genre (loved that Helen wasn’t turning to men as is standard; love mommy issues fiction). The setup was interesting, the story with the parents, the dead brother, and the elder abuse was fucked up and compelling until it just…fizzled out and went nowhere and none of it got explained or expanded on in even the slightest of terms. This could have been something, but the execution was tragic. I would spend more time digging into the plot, but it was so thin that’s literally all I have. There were interesting themes and I understand (I think?) where the author was trying to go with the buildup and the ending alike, but at the end of the day, it didn't work for me and hardly matters.
I will give exactly one point to this hilariously relatable thought spiral, and absolutely nothing else about this book:
I’ll be busy and inattentive, so you can keep Katrina company and take care of things. I said, What things? I thought about the aforementioned chickens and imagined one of them getting sick, really sick, and me having to administer medicine, having to drive to the clinic, having to demand help from an overworked nurse who did not quite believe the severity of the situation.
Anyway. Do not read this; I cannot recommend against this book enough. I hate everyone who let this happen to a cool idea and I think I might hate myself a little for not DNF’ing even though I’ve never DNF’d in my life.
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December 23, 2024omg kinda surprised this has such a low average rating... cant a depressed girl just cope with her problems by being the third to an older lesbian couple! next time i have a mental breakdown, i volunteer to be next!
dnf
June 6, 2024dnf
between A Good Happy Girl and Worry, it's official, i am feeling a gross-grimey girl fiction (aka the She's Not Feeling Good at All subgenre) fatigue. you know the drill by now: she's messed up, has daddy or mommy issues, doesn't know how to wash, doesn't want to wash, wants to be more or less treated like a dog by her dubious sex partners because of guilt, trauma, ennui, neglect. bodies are abject, bodily fluids abound, our main character thinks about outlandish things because she's just so messed up and weird, and her malaise is all consuming, warping her worldview and self-perception. chuck in some supposedly provocative scenes that are actually there for shock value and ta-da. you have on your hands a Sad Girl book.
the author here switches things up by making the mc a lesbian (usually they are in the realms of heterosexuality) and becoming involved with a married couple who in very Mona Awad fashion seem interchangeable. but at the end of the day this dynamic, of a single/lonely woman becoming involved with an older/more affluent couple is uninspired. Jean Rhys was doing it nearly 100 years ago in Quartet. many of these gross-self-sabotaging-sad girl books strike me as cash grabs.
pulpy yet profoundly uninspired, this book is not bringing anything new to the She's Not Feeling Good at All table.
between A Good Happy Girl and Worry, it's official, i am feeling a gross-grimey girl fiction (aka the She's Not Feeling Good at All subgenre) fatigue. you know the drill by now: she's messed up, has daddy or mommy issues, doesn't know how to wash, doesn't want to wash, wants to be more or less treated like a dog by her dubious sex partners because of guilt, trauma, ennui, neglect. bodies are abject, bodily fluids abound, our main character thinks about outlandish things because she's just so messed up and weird, and her malaise is all consuming, warping her worldview and self-perception. chuck in some supposedly provocative scenes that are actually there for shock value and ta-da. you have on your hands a Sad Girl book.
the author here switches things up by making the mc a lesbian (usually they are in the realms of heterosexuality) and becoming involved with a married couple who in very Mona Awad fashion seem interchangeable. but at the end of the day this dynamic, of a single/lonely woman becoming involved with an older/more affluent couple is uninspired. Jean Rhys was doing it nearly 100 years ago in Quartet. many of these gross-self-sabotaging-sad girl books strike me as cash grabs.
pulpy yet profoundly uninspired, this book is not bringing anything new to the She's Not Feeling Good at All table.
March 9, 2024
What does a happy ending mean to you? What would you do to get it?
I picked up A Good Happy Girl and then, in the span of 24 hours, lost my life to it. I can't remember the last time I read something that was such an assault to all the senses (in a good way) and yet found myself unable to put it down. When the narrator, Helen, ate, I could taste what she did. When she described bodily fluids, I recoiled, because they were there in the room with me as well. And when she ached-for something, someone? I wanted it, too. Just as badly.
This book does what so few pieces of literary fiction can successfully do, without being even a little pretentious. It completely, and sincerely, sews together a perfectly imperfect person.
I picked up A Good Happy Girl and then, in the span of 24 hours, lost my life to it. I can't remember the last time I read something that was such an assault to all the senses (in a good way) and yet found myself unable to put it down. When the narrator, Helen, ate, I could taste what she did. When she described bodily fluids, I recoiled, because they were there in the room with me as well. And when she ached-for something, someone? I wanted it, too. Just as badly.
This book does what so few pieces of literary fiction can successfully do, without being even a little pretentious. It completely, and sincerely, sews together a perfectly imperfect person.
July 21, 2024
Munchausen by lesbian polyamorous situationship
May 19, 2024
Girl I'm sorry but I hated this so much. Obnoxiously written, shallow, self-indulgent in all the wrong ways. With comparisons to Melissa Broder and Kristen Arnett (two of my all time favorite authors!) I was SO ready to love this, but nothing about it works. I think the biggest issue for me is the lack of any true reflection or sense of humor. Broder and Arnett are so damn good because they're able to articulate the absurdities of what it means to be human, to be a sexual being, to be a queer woman, etc etc. And this just felt.... I don't even want to say gross for the sake of being gross. It was more so like, gross because that is what's "cool" in lit fic I guess? But the grossness never really reveals anything deeper than what's been spoon fed to us over and over and over. The characters are all so underdeveloped. No one and nothing matters. And not in a fun or insightful way! Just in a bad way! This is, like, an edgy personal essay you'd peer review in an undergrad writing class and have to hold yourself back from rolling your eyes every five seconds.
At least the cover rocks!
At least the cover rocks!
February 25, 2024
Sometimes when I'm reading a particularly interesting book, I start trying to figure out what is so interesting about it. I try to figure out how I want to describe the characters or the prose. I take some pleasure out of this, obviously I enjoy writing reviews or I wouldn't be doing this right now. It is nice to find the right description, to be able to say "Ah yes, this is the thing I am enjoying so much." I tried to do this with A Good Happy Girl and absolutely failed. I cannot effectively describe its unique prose or characters. This is not a bad thing, if anything it just fascinated me more as I read. But even if you are not trying to write a review of this book I suspect you may find yourself in the same place. It is strange, it is often offputting, it is the kind of work that gets your attention.
It reminded me in small ways of other books I've really enjoyed that had a similar kind of frankness around sex and self-destruction, books like Little Rabbit and Luster and Pizza Girl and Acts of Service. If you enjoyed those books, you will probably enjoy this one. It is not the same as them, but since part of the reason I write reviews is to help people decide if they want to read a book, this is the best I can do.
It's an impressive tightrope Higgins walks. It would be very easy for one of the two plotlines--Helen's complex and kinky relationship with a pair of married women, and Helen's depression and crisis tied in with her imprisoned parents--to take over the story, to have one be not as strong as the other, to have one distract. But somehow they all feed back into the central black hole that is Helen, a strange animal who wants to ingest both pain and devotion. Any kindness Helen receives must be wrapped in a fist.
Higgins' prose is also hard to explain, I could never put my finger on it. It is often very frank and simple, and yet it turns in the most unexpected directions. Her sentences can be so surprising, the words and the meanings. Reading this book is like watching a very strange circus act or walking through a carnival tent of exotic feats. It is also one of the most queer books I have ever read in every sense of the word.
It reminded me in small ways of other books I've really enjoyed that had a similar kind of frankness around sex and self-destruction, books like Little Rabbit and Luster and Pizza Girl and Acts of Service. If you enjoyed those books, you will probably enjoy this one. It is not the same as them, but since part of the reason I write reviews is to help people decide if they want to read a book, this is the best I can do.
It's an impressive tightrope Higgins walks. It would be very easy for one of the two plotlines--Helen's complex and kinky relationship with a pair of married women, and Helen's depression and crisis tied in with her imprisoned parents--to take over the story, to have one be not as strong as the other, to have one distract. But somehow they all feed back into the central black hole that is Helen, a strange animal who wants to ingest both pain and devotion. Any kindness Helen receives must be wrapped in a fist.
Higgins' prose is also hard to explain, I could never put my finger on it. It is often very frank and simple, and yet it turns in the most unexpected directions. Her sentences can be so surprising, the words and the meanings. Reading this book is like watching a very strange circus act or walking through a carnival tent of exotic feats. It is also one of the most queer books I have ever read in every sense of the word.
May 28, 2024
Dnf. I was going to rate this 2.5 stars if I finished it anyways, but after I saw the author’s story.. it made me uncomfortable that she feels comfortable posting a negative review of her book to friends, other authors, and other readers alike (something I didn’t know was that there is a tiktok on her -public- account including this review as well labeled as a “read my book based on negative reviews” post). Ik that she didn’t show the username and didn’t bash said reviewer, but it’s easy to find that review and attack that person in “defense” of the writer (her acc is private, but it has over 1k followers). I believe authors have the right to read their reviews, but posting a person’s negative comments on your social profile opens them up for being targeted by your followers and that makes me feel really icky ://
Update: this review was then also posted so I’m retracting my two stars.
I thought maybe if you read it you’d understand what I was getting at, but evidently not. Please take this as a situation to learn from instead of continuing to post the og reviewers words (she has already continued to). Posting negative reviews is a known no-no in the author community. Some opinions and thoughts can be very hurtful, but in the end reviews are for other readers not intended for the writer to read unless promotional.
p.s. reviewing is supposed to be a safe space for readers to either compliment or critique what they read.
Update part two: This behavior has genuinely gotten on my nerves. You cannot claim you’re “responding to meanness/hate” when that review was never meant for your eyes. YOU chose to read reviews and YOU chose to click on a 1 star one (they quite literally at the top of the review warned it was going to be mean). There is a reason readers tell authors not to read their reviews. If you cannot privately handle your hurt feelings then you shouldn’t be reading reviews in the first place. Yes, the review was harsh, but it is not a reviewer’s responsibility to describe how they felt about your book in a way that you like. If you’re going to publish books, then you have to be prepared for opinions about them you won’t like. Your novels are now public and negative comments WILL be made about them. Every single book has negative reviews like this, yet I’m not seeing other authors respond in this way.. and my original review was not hate it was just saying I was not comfortable continuing to read a book by someone who’s publicly posting a negative review, but still I was posted as well. This behavior is wildly inappropriate and should have been handled entirely away from social platforms.
Update: this review was then also posted so I’m retracting my two stars.
I thought maybe if you read it you’d understand what I was getting at, but evidently not. Please take this as a situation to learn from instead of continuing to post the og reviewers words (she has already continued to). Posting negative reviews is a known no-no in the author community. Some opinions and thoughts can be very hurtful, but in the end reviews are for other readers not intended for the writer to read unless promotional.
p.s. reviewing is supposed to be a safe space for readers to either compliment or critique what they read.
Update part two: This behavior has genuinely gotten on my nerves. You cannot claim you’re “responding to meanness/hate” when that review was never meant for your eyes. YOU chose to read reviews and YOU chose to click on a 1 star one (they quite literally at the top of the review warned it was going to be mean). There is a reason readers tell authors not to read their reviews. If you cannot privately handle your hurt feelings then you shouldn’t be reading reviews in the first place. Yes, the review was harsh, but it is not a reviewer’s responsibility to describe how they felt about your book in a way that you like. If you’re going to publish books, then you have to be prepared for opinions about them you won’t like. Your novels are now public and negative comments WILL be made about them. Every single book has negative reviews like this, yet I’m not seeing other authors respond in this way.. and my original review was not hate it was just saying I was not comfortable continuing to read a book by someone who’s publicly posting a negative review, but still I was posted as well. This behavior is wildly inappropriate and should have been handled entirely away from social platforms.
October 2, 2023
A jagged, vulnerable, visceral, and delicious novel. A GOOD HAPPY GIRL is everything I hoped it would be from its whirlwind of a blurb—the raw entanglement of a queer throuple paired with the poignant fears and insecurities taking root in our narrator’s mind made for a satisfying spiral into chaos. Some of my favorite moments came from Helen’s reflections on and interactions with family, a presence that has only ever wounded her throughout her life and yet continues to be one of the few driving forces keeping her afloat. Of course, depravity in desire simultaneously rules above all else, and made this book an all-encompassing read. So, so good! Can’t wait to read it again and mark my copy up with all my favorite lines.
Thank you so much to Catapult for the advanced copy!
Thank you so much to Catapult for the advanced copy!
May 1, 2024
3.5
Medical lesbian masochism and throupling
Medical lesbian masochism and throupling
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
June 13, 2024
Sat through all that piss talk for a nothing ending. Thanks.
June 5, 2024
really not for me personally BUT I can see the appeal for others!! I highlighted several quotes that resonated w me but overall I am not the target reader for this book
May 28, 2024
i haven't been able to stop thinking about A GOOD HAPPY GIRL since i finished it over a week ago.
i truly felt sad for our main character, helen, who is clearly struggling with some trauma that hasn't been dealt with as she entagles herself with a lesbian couple.
she easily gets herself into situations that aren't healthy for her as she seeks validation from the married lesbian couple.
the writing is vivid, stunning and graphic where it needs to be in order to truly understand what helen is feeling and experiencing.
what i appreciate about this is the representation of intrusive thoughts because my god they can be debilitating (as someone who suffers from them semi-regularly).
ultimately, helen just wants to be seen, heard and loved in some way, when it's something she hasn't received from her unstable, abusive parents, who still ask more of her than they give.
marissa higgins is a new and upcoming force, whose writing is gritty and stunningly beautiful at the same time. i'm so excited for what she has next.
there are LOTS of trigger warnings with this, please be warned. but if you're wanting to read something about a woman who's completely lost and seeking validation in any way she can, you won't want to miss this.
A GOOD HAPPY GIRL is out april 2.
many thanks to my besties @catapult for this gifted copy, i will treasure it.
and congrats @marissahiggins_ on such a force of a debut.
i truly felt sad for our main character, helen, who is clearly struggling with some trauma that hasn't been dealt with as she entagles herself with a lesbian couple.
she easily gets herself into situations that aren't healthy for her as she seeks validation from the married lesbian couple.
the writing is vivid, stunning and graphic where it needs to be in order to truly understand what helen is feeling and experiencing.
what i appreciate about this is the representation of intrusive thoughts because my god they can be debilitating (as someone who suffers from them semi-regularly).
ultimately, helen just wants to be seen, heard and loved in some way, when it's something she hasn't received from her unstable, abusive parents, who still ask more of her than they give.
marissa higgins is a new and upcoming force, whose writing is gritty and stunningly beautiful at the same time. i'm so excited for what she has next.
there are LOTS of trigger warnings with this, please be warned. but if you're wanting to read something about a woman who's completely lost and seeking validation in any way she can, you won't want to miss this.
A GOOD HAPPY GIRL is out april 2.
many thanks to my besties @catapult for this gifted copy, i will treasure it.
and congrats @marissahiggins_ on such a force of a debut.
April 16, 2024
Rep: lesbian mc, lesbian lis, bi side character
Galley provided by publisher
I'm not really about to review this one very thoroughly here because I think the conclusion to draw is that it's just not for me. It wasn't my kind of book. Honestly, that was pretty evident from the first few pages (a writing style I just didn't vibe with), but it was fully clear when, on the first date with the wives at a coffee shop, our main character wonders what would happen if she wet herself. She later goes on to wonder what the wives would do if she pissed on one of them. The mummy issues are not subtle in the slightest. I'm sure it has its audience, but that audience unfortunately doesn't include me.
Galley provided by publisher
I'm not really about to review this one very thoroughly here because I think the conclusion to draw is that it's just not for me. It wasn't my kind of book. Honestly, that was pretty evident from the first few pages (a writing style I just didn't vibe with), but it was fully clear when, on the first date with the wives at a coffee shop, our main character wonders what would happen if she wet herself. She later goes on to wonder what the wives would do if she pissed on one of them. The mummy issues are not subtle in the slightest. I'm sure it has its audience, but that audience unfortunately doesn't include me.
April 10, 2024
So much vulnerability and tenderness i really enjoyed reading this one
July 31, 2024
this felt like it was trying so hard to be weird
April 15, 2024
This was really interesting — still formalizing my thoughts
April 10, 2024
I did not like one thing about this novel
September 29, 2023
A Good Happy Girl is weird. Really, really weird.
Imagine if you pulled all the weird thoughts running through the back of your head constantly & pulled them to the forefront. With no filter. And then you added a married lesbian couple that you obsessively wanted to sleep with (and/or possess completely). Then add a bunch of unresolved family drama/trauma.
Yep. Now you've got it.
It's weird. And totally worth reading. I found it wildly unsettling. But I think some folks will absolutely love it. And I'll sell it at Bookish by saying, "This is SO WEIRD. You should read it," as I put it in your hand.
Buy A Good Happy Girl from our Bookish Bookshop: https://bookshop.org/a/4334/978164622...
Imagine if you pulled all the weird thoughts running through the back of your head constantly & pulled them to the forefront. With no filter. And then you added a married lesbian couple that you obsessively wanted to sleep with (and/or possess completely). Then add a bunch of unresolved family drama/trauma.
Yep. Now you've got it.
It's weird. And totally worth reading. I found it wildly unsettling. But I think some folks will absolutely love it. And I'll sell it at Bookish by saying, "This is SO WEIRD. You should read it," as I put it in your hand.
Buy A Good Happy Girl from our Bookish Bookshop: https://bookshop.org/a/4334/978164622...
April 15, 2024
absolutely was not expecting this book to hit me where it hurts so deeply. the desperate desire to feel wanted but being worried by the idea of being loved due to the emotionally strained relationship with parents…are you kidding me? i didn’t like everything about this book but every time helen spoke about that feeling of reaching out but self destructing because you feel as though you don’t deserve it. not understand your body and your thoughts. giving yourself but making sure you give nothing at the same time i felt as though she was directly speaking to me in some way. i’m gonna be ill…
May 5, 2024
My problem with A Good Happy Girl is similar to the one I had with Eileen by Ottessa Moshfegh; the main character is a flawed woman and her faults are written so obviously that it becomes overwhelming- and yet what about the plot? The plot becomes secondary to her imperfections… her obsessions. Both books serve as poignant character studies, but falls short past its cringe-meter.
Like with Eileen, I held on to sick curiosity, for when shit really hits the fan… only for the climax to pass … and I see that the sum of the novel’s parts were just moments of embarrassment mixed in with descriptions of poor hygiene and self loathing with little payoff to make up for it.
2.5 🌟
Like with Eileen, I held on to sick curiosity, for when shit really hits the fan… only for the climax to pass … and I see that the sum of the novel’s parts were just moments of embarrassment mixed in with descriptions of poor hygiene and self loathing with little payoff to make up for it.
2.5 🌟
May 6, 2024
Not what I was expecting or wanting and I found the book a bit too gross. Maybe I'm just not smart enough but I just really didn't get the point of this book and found it mostly boring with very unlikeable characters! Honestly, it mostly felt like a waste of my time.
January 29, 2024
this is one i really WANTED to like. i'm constantly looking for polyamorous books that interest me, and for some reason, there's an insane amount of litfic poly books out there and continuing to come out this year.
the most intriguing part of this book, to me, was helen's relationship with her past and her parents. the inclusion of the wives often felt like detouring from the main point, which i suppose is partially the goal– helen using the wives to avoid the things that are dragging her down.
which brings me to my critique of the wives themselves. i hated that they didn't feel like two separate individuals. i recognize, of course, that this is once again the goal. it's just one of those things where i've seen the same exact literary polyamorous novel a thousand times over– a nearly apathetic young woman meeting two lovers, becoming involved in their lives, it all being strange and sometimes fucked up. i just want one that's actually an in depth character study of all three individuals, or at least an in depth character study of the main character with actual characters instead of symbols for romance options.
i think i'd recommend this for fans of luster that wanted more literary sex scenes?
the most intriguing part of this book, to me, was helen's relationship with her past and her parents. the inclusion of the wives often felt like detouring from the main point, which i suppose is partially the goal– helen using the wives to avoid the things that are dragging her down.
which brings me to my critique of the wives themselves. i hated that they didn't feel like two separate individuals. i recognize, of course, that this is once again the goal. it's just one of those things where i've seen the same exact literary polyamorous novel a thousand times over– a nearly apathetic young woman meeting two lovers, becoming involved in their lives, it all being strange and sometimes fucked up. i just want one that's actually an in depth character study of all three individuals, or at least an in depth character study of the main character with actual characters instead of symbols for romance options.
i think i'd recommend this for fans of luster that wanted more literary sex scenes?
April 3, 2024
I knew A Good Happy Girl was my kind of book when I marked six passages in the first four pages. Higgins' beautifully crafted melancholic style pulled me in, creating a personal connection I couldn't ignore. Describing my attachment to the main character, Helen, is challenging; she stands out as the most raw, unconventional, and vulnerable character I've encountered. However, Helen's struggles with parental dynamics, millennial-like dependence on cough syrup, and the complex desire for affection felt familiar to me. I can't praise this book enough; it reads like a diary of a wandering queer millennial but with engrossing and relatable scenes. Fans of Elle Nash, Ottessa Moshfegh, and Ella Baxter will likely resonate with this book.
I received an early e-book copy from NetGalley and Catapult Press, but I will be buying a hard copy to have Helen nearby.
I received an early e-book copy from NetGalley and Catapult Press, but I will be buying a hard copy to have Helen nearby.
Read
October 23, 2023Unsettling and poignant in equal measure, Higgins' debut is a pull on the cigarette you shouldn't be having, the shot of adrenaline you get when you wake up through the daze of a hangover and remember your bad dreams. It's a gorgeously written exploration of lesbian domesticity as well as an investigation of messy queer entanglement, of what happens when we want to be told we're good even though we know we're not. Being inside Helen's head was almost claustrophobic, a disorienting blend of obsessive self-hatred and contemplative desire. Weird, hot, and troubled, A GOOD HAPPY GIRL is a pitch-perfect entry into the lesbian canon.
December 2, 2024
i really wanted to love this book. it’s compulsively readable and the main character was such a trainwreck that i couldn’t look away, but i wasn’t sold on the relationship dynamics, i feel like the family dynamics weren’t explored to their full potential, and i think overall i found this book far more unsettling than i originally anticipated??? i think it will really work for some people, but just wasn’t for me.
Read
June 1, 2024Messy lesbian throuple novel shot through with mommy and daddy issues and a weirdly tender exploration of our desire to care and be cared for. For fans of Milk Fed who thought, you know, that could be a little kinkier.
April 27, 2025
Her always talking about feet completely and her selling feet pics and doing feet videos for money was just...no. Was low-key grossed out throughout most of the book and I really had to push through it. I lost interest maybe like half way into the book? but I was determined to finish it whether or not I liked it.
And tell me why she went to the bathroom and videotaped her feet at the place she worked of all places. 😭
I can definitely say I'm never reading this again, but I'm giving this ★★☆☆☆ mostly because I liked 2 of the characters but besides that, that's it.
And tell me why she went to the bathroom and videotaped her feet at the place she worked of all places. 😭
I can definitely say I'm never reading this again, but I'm giving this ★★☆☆☆ mostly because I liked 2 of the characters but besides that, that's it.
April 28, 2025
what (and I cannot stress this enough) the fuck
June 1, 2024
Best, most propulsive thing I’ve read since Deliver Me. For the “BPD girlies” according to TikTok. As uniquely dark and female. Cool drawings within of fruit and flowers. We immediately understand how this young woman is full of nervous energy: Her parents were locked up for drugs and lethally neglecting their kids and Grandma, letting them rot in their own filth. She is reckless yet anxious, a nympho lesbian. She’s on OTC uppers or naturally manic, scrubbing her filthy flat and cancelling dates. She’s all about manipulation and longing to find a “worthy” girl. There are no quotation marks or clear timelines though it fits her scattered brain, the sense she’s unreliable or omitting even to us. Especially since she can seem more worrisome than the dementia-ish grandma.
Crazy in a pretty accessible mindset. Scanning restaurants for dead family, speaking in flowing fragments, imaging mild violence she wants done to her. Psychoanalyzing her and everyone’s smallest action in prose. Perverted like the men she fears. She meets a lesbian couple she wants to move in with and dominate her. They seem like young pimply Valley Girls transplanted to New England, a bit snippy but normal, calm, minus the frequent kissing. But our girl Helen wants them attentively mean. “There’s a visibility in embarrassment,” she says. Before they seal their arrangement, we find out Helen works at a law firm and freely films her feet for fellow lesbians.
Things steadily escalate so Helen always seems far more sexual/deviant than them. The couple plays mind games though, disorienting teases about where they live or how they got together. The younger one, Katrina, watched her office feet show, and suddenly Helen feels skittish. Or so she plays, occasionally craving the upper hand she didn’t have in childhood to make someone feel ashamed. The language is so fluid, sometimes rhyming or extra gravitational like poetry, (even in easy subversions like saying swallowing “warmth” instead of puke, or “her pitch dropped into a wound,” but still rings so true. This must be a few people’s reality in totality and plenty in shades: mommy and daddy issues, fickle submission, anxiety, suicide you wish someone would do for you.
We continually chip away at our many questions, nothing ever feeling unnatural, rushed or slogged. The nerve spirals are almost psychedelic, which befits the blips mentioning her cough syrup addiction—but we never hear any real effects called out or in scene. While the throuple progresses, her dad keeps guilting her into writing a character letter to help him at his next parole hearing. She’s reluctant but a conflicted people-pleaser, and so the drama gets a double billing. At the end of chapters we’re usually reminded with a sentence that this story is told looking back and she keeps making the wrong moves, so that shovels yet more peril onto the (blue-flowered) plate.
Even though I kinda expect one of the big events, I am still emotionally invested and interested in everybody’s responses, how they play their hand, how similar they really are. So many foils of characters and parallels within parallels nicely spaced apart. The end teases many exciting prospects. The last few sentences felt a tad too soon, limp when we were distracted with family drama, always craving something more about the past, the mom, the brother or the consequences of tomorrow. Nonetheless, that is only a 1% drawback of a 99% compelling, truly original art piece.
Crazy in a pretty accessible mindset. Scanning restaurants for dead family, speaking in flowing fragments, imaging mild violence she wants done to her. Psychoanalyzing her and everyone’s smallest action in prose. Perverted like the men she fears. She meets a lesbian couple she wants to move in with and dominate her. They seem like young pimply Valley Girls transplanted to New England, a bit snippy but normal, calm, minus the frequent kissing. But our girl Helen wants them attentively mean. “There’s a visibility in embarrassment,” she says. Before they seal their arrangement, we find out Helen works at a law firm and freely films her feet for fellow lesbians.
Things steadily escalate so Helen always seems far more sexual/deviant than them. The couple plays mind games though, disorienting teases about where they live or how they got together. The younger one, Katrina, watched her office feet show, and suddenly Helen feels skittish. Or so she plays, occasionally craving the upper hand she didn’t have in childhood to make someone feel ashamed. The language is so fluid, sometimes rhyming or extra gravitational like poetry, (even in easy subversions like saying swallowing “warmth” instead of puke, or “her pitch dropped into a wound,” but still rings so true. This must be a few people’s reality in totality and plenty in shades: mommy and daddy issues, fickle submission, anxiety, suicide you wish someone would do for you.
We continually chip away at our many questions, nothing ever feeling unnatural, rushed or slogged. The nerve spirals are almost psychedelic, which befits the blips mentioning her cough syrup addiction—but we never hear any real effects called out or in scene. While the throuple progresses, her dad keeps guilting her into writing a character letter to help him at his next parole hearing. She’s reluctant but a conflicted people-pleaser, and so the drama gets a double billing. At the end of chapters we’re usually reminded with a sentence that this story is told looking back and she keeps making the wrong moves, so that shovels yet more peril onto the (blue-flowered) plate.
Even though I kinda expect one of the big events, I am still emotionally invested and interested in everybody’s responses, how they play their hand, how similar they really are. So many foils of characters and parallels within parallels nicely spaced apart. The end teases many exciting prospects. The last few sentences felt a tad too soon, limp when we were distracted with family drama, always craving something more about the past, the mom, the brother or the consequences of tomorrow. Nonetheless, that is only a 1% drawback of a 99% compelling, truly original art piece.
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