Welcome to Litsy!

Recent acquisition for our personal library.

Every once in a while, you find something good at the dollar store.

This book was especially hard to read due to the fact that it was written during a timeframe I and everyone else in the world would like to forget. I get it that the author needed to capitalize or get over her writing slump, but I could not fly by as quickly as I've done through her other novels because there is still a lot of pain and misinformation about COVID.

God, I love how she tells a story!
Without intending to, I ended up reading back-to-back pandemic books. The other was for library book group and had all the close-quartered sameness of that time. In contrast, ES delivers another of her quiet books and lets its rich and capacious interiority sing out.

Kate is struggling with self-isolating in November 2020, she breaks and goes for a forbidden walk in the hills of the Peak District. Her 16 year old son Matthew is home alone when he realises she‘s gone and turns to their elderly and vulnerable neighbour Alice. The fourth character is mountain rescue volunteer Rob, helping search for Kate. A third in, I was racing through this desperate to know the outcome. And when it comes, it packs a punch.

This was such a tense and melancholic read. Moss perfectly captures those first months of Covid and lockdown and all of that uncertainty. I‘m not sure I could have got through it had I read it closer to pandemic times. I really felt these characters thoughts and feelings.

I loved rereading this. The audiobook was wonderful. I started it New Year‘s Eve and on January 1st I caught COVID for the first time. It has made reading this (her book about COVID) far more interesting! ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

Just made it.
Happy new year!
January 2, 2025

I‘m having a lazy, post-Christmas day. Reading (and napping) with my dog close by. Good book so far!
December 27, 2024.

This is really well written. Somehow the author pulls 9/11 and the pandemic into a mystery of sorts centered around economically privileged people who seem ridiculous at times but not comically. It's good. Definitely recommend.

#BookSpinBingo @TheAromaofBooks

I enjoyed this collection of pandemic stories, even though---like the days during lockdown---the stories tend to blend into one another. In these stories, Doyle explores with sensitivity issues of connection, estrangement, vulnerability, mental illness, substance abuse, and grief. I know a lot of people still don't like revisiting that time, but I find it intriguing and therapeutic to look back at those years that have influenced so much.