Welcome to Litsy!

Well I will be looking for something light hearted on my shelves to read next because this was just so hard on my heart. An autistic mother with a teenaged daughter when new neighbors move in next door and insert themselves into their lives. It drags a bit in the middle but I was still ready to jump into the pages and fight everyone for being so cruel and dismissive of Sunday.

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All the Little Bird-Hearts, by Viktoria Lloyd-Barlow

Premise: An autistic mother and her daughter become swept up in the life of their glamourous new neighbours.

Review: This was long-listed for the 2023 Booker Prize and it certainly has the literary heft you‘d expect with that. It‘s well-written and has a strong point-of-view that provides good representation for autistic persons. Cont.

Elaine Feeney is now an automatic buy for me. I loved her first novel, As You Were, and I loved this one, too. (I'm not sure how to preorder her new book, since I can only find info on a UK edition?) I felt equally invested in Jamie, Tess, and Tadhg. I found myself rooting for each of them in different ways. I can see myself rereading this one at some point.

It was interesting to get into the heads of the young female competitive boxers featured in this novel. I liked how the author conveyed the intensity of the moment while also shifting to times in the girls' pasts and futures.

#ToB25
#gottacatchemall (Marshadow: fight or fighter) @PuddleJumper

⭐️⭐️⭐️💫 A book I never would have picked up if not for the #ToB25 short list! Unique structure of telling the stories if 8 teenage girl boxers as they fight in matches at a tournament in Reno. It was interesting enough while reading, but I finished it a few weeks ago and none of the characters or stories stayed with me. Soft pick.

This book was not for me, and I‘m not sure what it was. The boxing? The writing? Where there too many boxers so we spend too little time with the boxers? I‘m don‘t know, but it was something

#tob25