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The Measure by Nikki Erick – Blog Tour Book Review
About the Book
Your fate arrives in a box on your doorstep. Do you open it?
It’s the decision of a lifetime. It seems like just another morning. You make a cup of tea. Check the news. Open the front door. On your doorstep is a box. Inside the box is the exact number of years you have left to live. The same box appears on every doorstep across the world.
The Measure is a transfixing contemplation of fate, a piercing exploration of how we value our lives, and a soaring story of love and heartbreak. When the world shifts irrevocably overnight, each character is faced with an immense decision. As boxes open across the world, their lives intertwine in moving, unexpected ways. An unforgettable story of love, resilience, and hope. Perfect for fans of Jodi Picoult, David Nicholls, Matt Haig and Stuart Turton.
About the Author
Nikki Erlick’s writing has appeared on the websites of New York Magazine, Harper’s Bazaar, Newsweek, Cosmopolitan and The Huffington Post. She graduated Harvard University summa cum laude and is a former editor of The Harvard Crimson. She earned a master’s degree in Global Thought from Columbia University. The Measure is her debut novel. @nikkierlick @BoroughPress
What I Thought
When publishers talk about high concept, this book is exactly what they mean. And this concept does deliver in the telling too.
Told from multiple points of views (8) but from a series of people who are connected or becoming connected throughout the story. Each with a distinctive voice.
The opening of the story hit very close to home and I’d be interested to know how much of the story was influenced by the pandemic. The discussion felt very real about how we accept or face up to our risk of mortality, how much we accept or mitigate risk.
The concept was so spooky. That one day everyone who is 22 and over gets a box on their doorstep. Maybe Terry Pratchett’s Death got fed up of playing the Hogfather and decided to deliver everybody their life expectancy! Children are exempted from this knowledge until the day they reach 22. Is this a gift or a curse to them?
In Adam Silvera’s They Both Die at the End people only find out their fate on the day that they will die, here people are given notice but what will they do with it?
We follow the characters as they decide whether or not to open their boxes, initially not understanding what the strings inside mean and then how they deal with the fate they have been given. Some with hope and others with despair – and not always in the way you’d expect.
Society is quickly divided into short-stringers and long-stringers and both groups have their challenges.
Human connection sees them reach out to others with the same experience and it sees them keep living their everyday lives because, until it does, life doesn’t stop. Births, marriages, death, loss.
This is one of those philosophical books that makes excellent book group material because it touches on what are fundamental questions to humanity. I highly recommend it, although trigger warning wise it won’t always be the right time for people to read something like this. As with the best of books there is hope amongst any despair that features heavy topics and you will get attached to characters – with all lengths of strings. How long will they be with the reader? Like people, as long as they remain in our memories and hearts!
Thanks to Tracy at Compulsive Readers working with Anne Cater at Random Things Tours – and the publishers – for the gifted ARC for the purposes of an honest review. Do check out what everyone else on the tour thought too and tell me below – would you open your box?
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Here for the Drama by Kate Bromley – Blog Tour Book Review
About the Book
She came for a job. What she’ll get is the performance of a lifetime.
Aspiring playwright Winnie D’Angelo has spent the past seven years waiting in the wings, working as a personal assistant to celebrated, feminist playwright, Juliette Brassard. But when an experimental theatre company in London, England decides to stage Juliette’s most renowned play, accompanying her mentor across the pond could finally be Winnie’s moment in the spotlight-assuming everything goes smoothly. And with Juliette’s very charming and very off-limits British (hello, hot accent!) nephew suddenly in Winnie’s flustered orbit, what could possibly go wrong?
Smart, handsome, and sweet, Liam is everything Winnie didn’t expect from what’s turning out to be an increasingly hectic work trip, but his family ties to Winnie’s boss pose a serious problem. Still, Winnie is falling for him. Hard. How could she not when the guy’s kisses are worthy of a thousand encores? But with Juliette stubbornly butting heads with the play’s director, Winnie knows that more than anything, the show must go on, even if it comes at the expense of her own work-and her burgeoning relationship with a guy she suspects might always hold her heart, even from half a world away.
About the Author
Kate Bromley lives in New York City with her husband, son, and her somewhat excessive collection of romance novels (it’s not hoarding if it’s books, right?). She was a preschool teacher for seven years and is now focusing full-time on combining her two great passions – writing swoon-worthy love stories and making people laugh. Here for the Drama us her second novel after Talk Bookish to Me.
What I Thought
I really enjoyed Talk Bookish to Me so was looking forward to this one too. Here for the Drama has lots of the same ingredients and still exisits in the world of writing, just this time it’s scripts.
Winnie was a very relatable heroine. Somewhat passive at the start of the novel and probably struck by a bit of imposter syndrome, hence the unfinished play.
The dynamic between her and Juliette was a little Devil Wears Prada but with Juliette actually being likeable and also full of her own insecurities. Her persistence and demanding attitude is what sets the story rolling through until our heroine can start taking her life into her own hands.
Online dating experiences definitely make for fun and cringeworthy experiences so there is plenty of humour in the earlier chapters until the person Winnie is seemingly destined for is right under her nose although somewhat forbidden fruit due to the familial connection and his inherent distractibility.
The writing, and therefore reading was effortless and this does exactly what it says on the cover. Gives some drama but with predictable satisfaction as the curtain falls.
If you enjoy Emily Henry (or any of the books in my picture above) then these books should be added to your TBRs too. And they are allowed to be Neverending unlike the stories that they contain (that reminds me – must get back to my WIP).
Thanks to Tracey at Compulsive Readers and the publisher for a gifted copy for the purposes of an honest review. Do check out everyone on the tour too.
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The Girl on the 88 Bus by Freya Sampson – Blog Tour Book Review
About the Book
When Libby Nicholls arrives in London, broken-hearted and with her life in tatters, the first person she meets on the bus is elderly pensioner Frank. He tells her about the time in 1962 he met a girl on the number 88 bus with beautiful red hair just like her own. They made plans for a date at the National Gallery, but Frank lost the ticket with her number written on it. For the past sixty years, he’s ridden the same bus trying to find her.
Libby is inspired by the story and, with the help of an unlikely companion, she makes it her mission to help Frank’s search. As she begins to open her guarded heart to strangers and new connections, Libby’s tightly controlled world expands. But with Frank’s dementia progressing quickly, their chance of finding the girl on the number 88 bus is slipping away.
More than anything, Libby wants Frank to see his lost love one more time. But their quest also shows Libby just how important it is to embrace her own chances for happiness – before it’s too late.
A beautifully uplifting novel about how one chance meeting can change the course of your life
About the Author
Freya Sampson works in TV and was the creator and executive producer of Channel 4’s Four in a Bed and Gogglesprogs. She studied History at Cambridge University and is a graduate of the Faber Academy. She lives in London with her husband, two young children and an antisocial cat. The Last Library was her debut novel.
What I Thought
Well, this was just a big hug in a book, and one that actually had me guessing at what would happen – mostly incorrectly but I liked the mystery of it.
Our main character Libby, when we first meet her, is ‘on an enforced break’ from a long term relationship. She moves to London to live temporarily with her sister Rebecca – the two seem to have a slightly fractious relationship and that’s not exactly helped when she is treated as a replacement to their live in nanny.
Libby’s first meeting in London is with pensioner Frank who, on spying her red hair, sees in her the image of his ‘one that got away’ – the eponymous Girl on the 88 bus. What leads from this chance encounter is a fabulous story of intergenerational friendship, love, loss and hope. Hope that it isn’t too late for second or third chances to follow your dreams.
Frank is a delight, and although we see his sadly inevitable decline it is handled in a very respectful way and not over-sensationalised. His diagnosis does also give the novel a sense of urgency.
Although Libby’s helping him is a way for her to shift concentration away from her own life and challenges, her humanity and kindness shine through because she maintains the contact throughout and beyond the resolution of their hunt.
Frank encourages Libby to pursue her passion for art, but her attempt at drawing someone on the bus lands her in trouble with a punk – or does it? I guess it depends how you define trouble.
The ‘all is lost’ section gets flipped on its head somewhat at the close but provides the dramatic tension and pause to move the plot forward. All in all this is a beautifully crafted plot.
The ending was bittersweet but with enough hopefulness to make it satisfying. So much so that I’m off to download Freya’s debut now – The Last Chance Library.
Trigger warnings: Advancing Dementia, off the page mentions of physical abuse/violence, brief discussions re infertility
Thanks to Tracy at compulsive Readers and the publisher for a gifted ARC copy for the purposes of this honest review. Do see what everyone else on the tour thought.
kirstyes 