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Life Events
Life Events: A Novel | Karolina Waclawiak
4 posts | 4 read | 11 to read
One of BuzzFeed's Most Anticipated Books of 2020 and one of The Millions Most Anticipated Books of the First Half of 2020 A woman at a crossroads learns the only way to reclaim her life is to help others die What if Evelyns whole life has been a mistake? At 37, shes on the verge of divorce and anxiously awaiting everyone she loves dying on her. She combats her existential crisis by avoiding her husband and wandering the freeways of California looking for an escape before discovering a collective of exit guides. Evelyn enrolls in training courses where she learns to provide companionship and a final exit for terminally ill patients looking for a conscious departure. She meets Daphne, a dying woman still full of life; Lawrence, an aging porn king; and Daniel, who seems too young to die, and whom she cant help but fall for. Each client allows her a chance to access her own grief and confront the self-destructive ways she suppresses her pain. When Evelyn travels through the Southwest to an afterlife convention, she must finally face her complicated relationship with her alcoholic father and reckon with her life choices. Life Events is about planning your next phase when you see your past as a failure and your future as an impossible obligation. Sensitively observed and darkly funny, Karolina Waclawiaks breakout novel follows a woman searching for answers and intimacy while facing profound questions about how we live and die today.
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Karmapen
Life Events: A Novel | Karolina Waclawiak
Pickpick

This book was so sad that at points it made me feel physically nauseated. It kind of reminded me of fight club in the narrator uses support group to cope with insomnia trope, but she gets no respite and we get a front seat to her just trashing her life, even though she doesn‘t really know why or how to stop.

Reggie Have you read her other book? The Invaders. It was pretty good. 4y
Karmapen @Reggie I haven‘t, I‘ll add it to my list! Is it as sad as this one was? 4y
Reggie @Karmapen no, that one had a lot more bite to it. It‘s only 180 pgs but it was pretty good. It was the reason I picked this one up. 4y
2 likes3 comments
review
Reggie
Life Events: A Novel | Karolina Waclawiak
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Pickpick

This was good, challenging, and oddly enough, therapeutic. Evelyn is 37 and drowning in grief at the impending deaths of her parents. She‘s also trying to reckon with her father‘s alcoholism. Compounding this is the dissolution of her marriage. Trying to get a handle on all this she becomes an exit guide to people who have chosen to die by assisted suicide. Though there was a lot of loneliness in this book it also had its funny moments. Pick.

Cathythoughts Nice review 👍🏻sounds like a good one 4y
Reggie @Cathythoughts Thanks, Cathy! It was but it is deep and be prepared to confront your feelings on certain topics. 4y
Tanisha_A It does sounds sad, but good. Stacked! 4y
hot Hlooo 4y
Reggie @hot Hi. 4y
71 likes5 stack adds5 comments
quote
Reggie
Life Events: A Novel | Karolina Waclawiak
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Look what showed up in my book! This church is actually 10 miles away from where I live. It‘s the Chimayó Church. During the week of Easter, you can see all kinds of people on roads and streets making their pilgrimage to the church.

CaffeineAndCandy Super cool ❤ 4y
Palimpsest 😊That‘s cool! 4y
TorieStorieS So fun to stumble on local connections!!! 4y
Lindy Chimayo brings back fond memories of the first trip I took with my sweetheart, Laurie. 23 years ago, for her 40th birthday, she wanted to see New Mexico. We spent two weeks travelling around and loved it. We still repeat private phrases from that time that make us laugh, like “Truchas means trout” (from a strange gallery owner; it was the way he said it, like a posh university lecturer). 4y
62 likes5 comments
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BookNAround
Life Events: A Novel | Karolina Waclawiak
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Today‘s #MayARC is released on 5/19. A woman who helps others die as an “exit guide” learns how to live herself. Might be a hard read given the state of the world but it sounds fascinating to me.