Welcome to Litsy!

It's a hell of a premise: the kidnapping, by three of the "brides", of a baker's dozen of bachelors on a "romance tour" in Ukraine, whilst seeking a mate for possibly the last snail of his species. And then the war starts. (Remember this next time someone says all the stories have already been told.) Oh, it is dark and it is funny.

I loved it until it got just too meta and felt like its cleverness tipped over into cleverness-signalling.

Already love Yeva who just wants to travel around saving snails.

This novel wasn't a complete hit for me, but I did enjoy the author's exploration of otherness and belonging, of watching tragedy over which one has little to no control unfolding in ways both real and absurd and not knowing the proper response. This novel feels almost existentialist or perhaps Stoic in the sense that it recognizes both the futility of action and how this futility makes our own storytelling and meaning-making all the more crucial.

A snail biologist takes on sex work to fund her mobile lab. And then things got really interesting. One of my top three reads this year.

I was so impressed by the originality of this book. Brilliant layers of a novel in a novel, a writer that is also a main character, and a very real invasion of Ukraine. Like the spirals of a snail shell perhaps? After reading this, I wish it had made the Booker shortlist.

#10BeforetheEnd

Alright, here are my #10BeforetheEnd picks for this year. 📚

@ChaoticMissAdventures

Endling was an incredible, multi-faceted read.

Yeva is a conservationist trying to save populations of rare snails from dying out. Nastia and Sol are trying to lure their activist mother out of hiding by staging a kidnapping of marriage-industry bachelors.

Their plans are swiftly derailed by the Russian invasion.

I found the storytelling so compelling that even the unsubtle metafictional elements managed to win me over.

A writer to watch.

#turnthepage @Bookwormjillk

So far this readathon I have finished Endling (rtc), and been reading Dumb Witness, Murder in the House of Omari and the new Patricia Lockwood: will there ever be another you!

Not sure of page counts but I think I'm doing pretty well!!! 🩷

Shoot. I really wanted the tagged book to be on the short list. #Booker2025

#BookerLonglist #6

A highly original novel about 3 Ukrainian women on a road trip with some men they keep captive while Russia invades their country. Also, they are looking for a special kind of snail. I loved the fist half and the part which is an interlude by the author herself. Then however I lost interest a bit. So many super interesting story lines and yet I felt like nothing much happened. A so-so for me.

#ReadTheWorld2025 #28 #Albania

#BookerLonglist —perhaps my most ‘looking forward to‘ of the list. Endling didn‘t disappoint and did stretch my brain in ways, blending auto-fiction with several other themes and formats. But you know what? I was anticipating more snails. I just need more snails. But still, a great read. This would be a good one to dissect. But no snail dissection, please.

🤣🤣🤣

#WeeklyForecast 38/25

I still haven‘t finished the Sarah Moss but I picked it up again and think I am on the point where I want to finish it! In the mean time I started the El Akkad which is super confrontational and a must read for all of us. Next will be my final Booker for the announcement of the shortlist, which is the tagged one. And I have the fourth On the Calculation of Volume waiting for me!

Take away the balconies, and the bombed building looks just like my cousins'. Lop it down to five stories, and it could be my grandfather's Khrushchev-era apartment building in Kherson, another city under siege. Cruel, how Soviet apartment blocks look alike. I've been watching the same building get bombed, resurrected, bombed, over and over on my phone, laptop, on the TV screen at the corner store.

#Booker2025

Metafiction where fiction and reality collide, snails, critique of international bride industry, dark humor, commentary on Ukraine war, the power and impact of storytelling…

I absolutely loved this book. My favorite so far from the Booker list (although I still have a few to go). #bookerprize

#treatyoself

First pumpkin latte of the season with a fresh new read and pistachio cream cronut. In other words, bliss.

I had mixed feelings about this. I loved it at first with the strong women characters & the story of yeva‘s conservation work & struggles felt true. Nastia‘s plan was more convoluted & it was hard to sustain the idea of them in the marriage agency, then the heist plot was too fanciful for me. I liked the deadpan humour & innovative switch to autofiction when real events took over. Moving but i didn‘t care about the characters so it fell flat.

Yes! A #bookerlonglist title that I loved! It starts off focusing on three women in the Ukraine, a scientist trying desperately to save rare snails from extinction and two sisters taking part in tours that match foreign men with potential Ukrainian brides. As the three characters become entangled in a scheme Russia invades and everything changes. I don‘t want to spoil anything but this book has so much to say and is so smart and darkly funny.

Hmm, given this funding climate perhaps I should try self-funding 😂😂

It‘s definitely a book-related post, even though it may not look like it!

A rare ‘lefty‘ snail is one of the main characters in the tagged book, longlisted for the #bookerprize. 😝

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2025/aug/27/campaign-find-love-left-spiralling...

23-5 Aug 2015 (audiobook)
#Bookerlonglist25 No 6
What starts as a somewhat quirky story about the Ukrainian bridal industry and endangered snails, turns into a work of quite absurdist metafictjon
An interesting and entertaining read that I expect will be shortlisted and perhaps even win this year‘s Booker.

A Ukrainian woman seeking to find snails before they become extinct & two sisters participating in the bridal tourism industry meet up & become embroiled in a journey with 13 men they‘ve abducted & placed in their mobile van. In the middle of the story things change, the Russian invasion begins, and the author begins to speak of her ancestry and her feelings about the invasion. Then we return to the story already in progress. A five star read.

Started Endling yesterday.

First chapter was so good that I almost don't want to read the rest in case it disappoints.

Brilliant opening ❤️🐌

#BookerLonglist
What a wild ride! It burrowed into my brain in the best ways, made me think, and then every once in a while dealt a fierce punch to the heart. This kind of mutli-genre novel can be a very tricky tightrope and requires special talent to manage, esp. when you bring in elements of metafiction and autofiction. Reva accomplishes an impressive feat, like Percival Everett says in his blurb “I like it when a book is smarter than me!“ cont

#bookerlonglist #11

I found the first half of the book really compelling and intriguing, with the mix of marriage-bureau and saving the snails. (sounds odd but kind-of works!)

I also liked the meta-fiction elements, where the author inserts her own thoughts on the Ukraine war into the storyline.

Later on, it all started to get a bit dis-jointed and I didn‘t think the author quite nailed the ending.

A little porch read and a little dig at the former and current White House resident.

This is referencing the text that provides details on why men would want to go to Ukraine to find a bride.

My 1st from the #Booker longlist. #Booker2025

🐌s, an industry of Ukraine brides for foreign bachelors, and the gruesome invasion.

I was nervous at first, but the book does a shift at about page 100, a metafictional interlude. The context changes and what I didn‘t like before i suddenly adored. I finished having really enjoyed it, and having been smitten. It was fun and disarmingly deep. I'm still thinking on it.

Her mother's theory: The Internet was to blame. The Internet overwhelmed young people with dating choices. The original Yeva, biblical Eve, had no such choice. God put her in front of the fact of Adam, and that was that.
"Didn't she cheat on him with the snake?"
"But it wasn't with the snake that she created all of humanity."
"Have you seen humanity lately?"

#BookerLonglist

Endling, by Maria Reva (2025 🇨🇦)
⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

Premise: The plans of 3 Ukrainian women—one trying to preserve critically endangered snails and two trying to bring down the dating tourism industry—and a disaffected Ukrainian-Canadian man are upended when Russian forces invade.

Review: This is one of the strangest books I‘ve read, from its unique content/themes to the incursion of real-world events into the book‘s autofictional elements. ⬇️

And i also started this last night, from the #Booker2025 longlist. An endling is the last of a species to die before extinction. The book is so far a look at extinction, a kind of bride-supplier, and the Ukraine on the edge of the coming big invasion.