Joan Smokes

by Angela Meyer

Winner of the inaugural Mslexia Novella Award (2019).

She used to be someone else, but now she's arrived in Vegas, where she can start again. It won't do to let the past leak in. It's the Sixties now. She's going to become ... Joan. She makes a list: Buy a new dress (fitted, floral). Dye her hair (dark). Curl it. Buy red lipstick. Buy cigarettes and a lighter, too: Joan, she decides, is a smoker. There's no need to dwell on why she's here, what went before. She is just moving forward, one foot in front of the other, becoming that new person. Joan. This city of flashing neon, casinos and shows is full of distractions. Finding a job will be quick and easy. Things to do. New people to meet. A clean sheet. She's certainly not thinking about Jack, or ... No. Not anymore. Her new life starts right here, right now.

Genres: Fiction, Novella, Short Stories, Historical Fiction

76 pages, Paperback

Published December 5, 2019

About the author

Angela Meyer’s debut novel A Superior Spectre (Ventura Press, ANZ & Saraband, UK) was shortlisted for an Aurealis Award, the MUD Literary Prize, an Australian Book Industry Award, and the Readings Prize for New Australian Writing. She is also the author of a novella, Joan Smokes, which won the inaugural Mslexia Novella Award (UK), and a book of flash fiction, Captives. Her work has been widely published in magazines, journals and newspapers. She has worked in bookstores, as a book reviewer, in a whisky bar, and as commissioning editor and then publisher at Echo Publishing, where she was responsible for award-winning, internationally published and bestselling works. She now works as a freelance structural and story editor and consultant. She grew up in Northern NSW and lives in Melbourne.

Reviews

[Dee · Rating 4 out of 5]

Well, i was not expecting this story to turn out the way it did. Very well put together and i love the sort of diary style writting.
Joan was a great character and full of life and heartache all mixed up into one bundle.
A fabulous little read that packs a small punch.

[Cathy · Rating 4 out of 5]

Who is Joan? Or rather, who is the woman who currently calls herself Joan, seemingly just the latest in a series of assumed names and characters? Like an actress playing a role, our narrator considers what someone called Joan would do. How would she dress, what colour would her hair be, what car would she drive? She knows for sure she would smoke. Yes, Joan smokes. As she muses at one point, her life is ‘a fabrication, a performance’.

It seems though that however far she travels there are things she can’t leave behind. Joan muses, ‘How does the mind learn to let things go?‘ prompting the reader to wonder what is it she’s trying to let go of: traumatic memories, past actions, emotional ties? As details of Joan’s relationship with the troubled Jack are gradually revealed, we understand more why she asks ‘Was there passion without pain?’

The book is characterized by spare, sharp prose and acutely observed descriptions of people, objects and places. For example, I loved Joan’s first impression of the Las Vegas strip: ‘The lights make sound in her eyes. On one sign: the soprano crescendo of pink. On another, a swooshing fan of green-blue.’

Despite being less than eighty pages, Joan Smokes packs a powerful emotional punch with its haunting story of rejection, loss and trying to start over.

[N · Rating 3 out of 5]

In the opening of Joan Smokes, a woman arrives in Las Vegas in the 1960s and decides to reinvent herself as someone new: a woman named Joan, who smokes. This novella is a lot like Joan. You're never really sure who she is or what she might do.

I stayed engaged with Joan (and with Joan) the whole way through. It's a sensuous and lovely read. But I found the narrative decisions frustrating (we never find out what happened to her husband or her child; the novel ends with a question mark) . Ultimately, it's hard to wrap your arms around either Joan or Joan Smokes.

[Rebecca Bowyer · Rating 5 out of 5]

Just 68 pages: the right words, in the correct proportions, all slotted in the best places. This is story stripped back to its bare essentials. I can't wait to see what Angela Meyer writes next.

Warning: Do not read this if you've just quit smoking. You'll be reaching for a new pack before you get to the final page.

[Nessa’s Book Reviews · Rating 4 out of 5]

Angela Meyer’s "Joan Smokes" is a captivating novella that transports readers to the glitzy, neon-soaked world of 1960s Las Vegas.

This quick, entertaining read delves into themes of reinvention and escape, offering a glimpse into one woman’s quest for a fresh start.

Our FMC arrives in Vegas determined to leave her past behind and become someone new, Joan. With a list of transformative steps, buying a fitted floral dress, dyeing her hair dark, curling it, and adopting a smoker’s persona—she embarks on a journey of self-reinvention. Joan is a woman on a mission to redefine herself amidst the flashing neon lights, casinos, and constant distractions that Vegas offers.

The Sixties setting is vividly brought to life, immersing readers in an era of change and liberation. Joan’s determination to move forward, one step at a time, is both relatable and inspiring. The city’s allure provides a perfect backdrop for her transformation, as she navigates new jobs, meets new people, and tries to forget the shadows of her past, most notably, someone named Jack.

Meyer’s writing is crisp and evocative, capturing Joan’s inner turmoil and the tantalising promise of a new beginning.

Despite its brevity, "Joan Smokes" packs an emotional punch, exploring how we construct identities and the lengths we go to escape our former selves.

Joan’s story is one of resilience and hope, wrapped in the glimmering allure of Las Vegas. I

A huge thank you to Saraband for gifting me this title in exchange for an honest review.

[Julie Manthey · Rating 3 out of 5]

This novella is about a middle aged woman who experiences a horrific family tragedy and then shortly after moves to Las Vegas to start a new life. She changes her name to Joan and takes on the new persona of a woman who smokes and who wants to be a showgirl instead of facing her grief. Although the setting takes place in the Vegas of the early 1950s, all of the characters speak rather formally and more like they live in posh British country estate vice anything mid-century American or remotely Vegas. Yet, if you read over that and suspend disbelief- it's a quick and interesting read about a woman on the edge who is trying to avoid grief by becoming someone else, yet naturally completely unable to do so.

[Cass Moriarty · Rating 5 out of 5]

Holy smokes! A good novella is one that packs a punch with so few words it seems impossible; a great novella is the likes of Joan Smokes (Contraband 2019) by Angela Myer, the winner of the inaugural Mslexia Novella Award. Featuring themes of grief and loss, ambition, ‘settling’, relationships and poverty and social class, Joan Smokes captures the reinvention of a woman who has suffered tragedy and is determined to become someone else in Vegas. Let’s call her Joan. Joan wears red lipstick and a floral dress. Joan smokes. Joan carries secrets that even she cannot tell. A richly imagined story of pared back prose which has the ability to make something out of the everyday nothing minutia of life.

[marihana · Rating 4 out of 5]

4🌟: “She had wondered if easy was real, and better. Was there passion without pain? She is beginning to understand. But Jack had been hers and no one else will ever have that.”

Joan Smokes was a killer novella to start the year off with, man. It was short, sharp and elusive.

We follow a woman that has freshly arrived in Las Vegas and rebranding herself as Joan - naturally fleeing her dark past. She smokes, she slays and she’s Australian.

The story flowed effortlessly and wasn’t hindered by the past and present storylines. Joan felt actualised and nuanced and her relationships with those around her were purposeful and effective. I, am biased and also, love Aussie representation and authors, bro. My only real gripe is that the ending is so abrupt and so unbelievably vague. It was also never explicitly explained what happened to her husband and son - and while I can infer - it just felt lazy.

I will be looking to pick up more from this author and definitely recommend this as a palate cleanser.

[Raz · Rating 4 out of 5]

For some reason I missed that this was a novella when I bought it online, so I was a bit disappointed when it arrived in the mail and I saw how short it was (68 pages, and it's not a dense writing style so a lot of pages only consist of a few lines of text).

I was pleasantly surprised at how much emotional depth the author packs into such a small book! There's so much in here about surviving trauma and unhealthy relationships that rings true, I was really invested.

I do think the ending was a little abrupt, but that's not much of a complaint as the rest of the story made up for it. There's also something kind of cinematic about Angela Meyer's writing here; in my head I was imagining this playing out as a TV show with someone like Christina Hendricks as Joan.

[Matilda · Rating 4 out of 5]

I read Joan Smokes as a break from a bigger book I’m reading. It as a really interesting refresher, just the right length for what it is. I don’t usually like books set before the 2000s but this surprised me! I really enjoyed it.

It provides just enough context for you to understand what’s going on in Joan’s life, but not too much where we aren’t left with questions. Which I like.

I think it’s important for some books to leave room for interpretation, and this one did it just right. A really good read and very interesting :)

[Kali Napier · Rating 4 out of 5]

4.5* Who do you become when your life has been atomised? Joan arrives in Vegas in the sixties. She smokes, she does many things for the first time because they’re what Joan would do. She lives as she hasn’t done for 18 cardboard years. A slim novella, at times told in fragments, short vignettes. But I lingered long in Meyer’s artful prose, the onomatopoeia and rhythms of her sentences.

[Tom Hurst · Rating 3 out of 5]

Angela Meyer’s interesting, very short novella gradually reveals why the woman who calls herself Joan has come to Las Vegas to reinvent herself, at a time of nuclear tests in the desert.

I’m not a big fan of the choppy, oblique style this is written in, but perhaps it suits a character trying to escape the past. For me, it made the story a little too self-conscious and unreal.

[Sakun Sambanthan · Rating 3 out of 5]

Compact. Descriptions in this book speaksm volumes. Very sad though. Sounds like a survivor of domestic violence living with a partner suffering from PTSD. Finally she finds her way out. Sounds like her child died too. That was a little vague. Otherwise an well put together novella.

[Sam Bowron · Rating 4 out of 5]

Wonderful internal portrait of a woman reborn. Swiftly paced and enlightening.

[Rosa · Rating 4 out of 5]

A slight and sad book; I didn't quite connect with it, but I did feel the protagonist's pain acutely. I'd like to know the rest, really.

[Mads · Rating 4 out of 5]

3.5 rounded up

this was good!! a little bit too fragmented and choppy at parts, but i liked the prose

[Lel Budge · Rating 5 out of 5]

How does the mind learn to let things go?”

Set in the 60’s, an unnamed woman has arrived in Vegas, she’s calling herself Joan …and Joan with her floral dresses and dark hair …smokes, it’s what a Joan would do!

She will not think about the past, just walk to the future, one small step at a time…

What is Joan running from? What is so terrible, she hasn’t even found the right words yet to write to her mother in Australia?

This is a tiny book, a 68 page novella, but don’t let that fool you …this is something special. The tale of a woman on the edge of a breakdown, who thinks if she changes herself she can forget….it never happened did it? That was someone else?

Incredible, sophisticated and emotion packed literature.

Thank you to Ruth Killick Publicity for the opportunity to read this for free. This is my honest and unbiased review.