Author: Lily King
Genre: Literary Fiction
Publisher: Grove Press
Publication Date: March 3, 2020
Book Description: Following the breakout success of her critically acclaimed and award-winning novel Euphoria, Lily King returns with an unforgettable portrait of an artist as a young woman.
Blindsided by her mother’s sudden death, and wrecked by a recent love affair, Casey Peabody has arrived in Massachusetts in the summer of 1997 without a plan. Her mail consists of wedding invitations and final notices from debt collectors. A former child golf prodigy, she now waits tables in Harvard Square and rents a tiny, moldy room at the side of a garage where she works on the novel she’s been writing for six years. At thirty-one, Casey is still clutching onto something nearly all her old friends have let go of: the determination to live a creative life. When she falls for two very different men at the same time, her world fractures even more. Casey’s fight to fulfill her creative ambitions and balance the conflicting demands of art and life is challenged in ways that push her to the brink.
Writers & Lovers follows Casey—a smart and achingly vulnerable protagonist—in the last days of a long youth, a time when every element of her life comes to a crisis. Written with King’s trademark humor, heart, and intelligence, Writers & Lovers is a transfixing novel that explores the terrifying and exhilarating leap between the end of one phase of life and the beginning of another.
Rating: 2 1/2 Stars
Review: I am going to make a bold statement, and say Lily King is just not the author for me. I so want to love her, but it is unfortunate that I just cannot.
Casey is lost in this world. She is in her early 30’s, her mother has recently died, she is estranged from her father and her brother lives on the other coast. Casey has a great education and strives to be a published author. She is also in massive debt, trying to make ends meet to pay her enormous student loans.
Let me be very clear, the writing is brilliant. I personally could not get past that were zero chapter markings. King really does divide the book into Writers & Lovers. When I was reading about the artist, I could absolutely not put it down. Intertwined are the many lovers of Casey, and I found myself just not caring.
This is a book that does get stronger as you read and you get more invested in Casey, however it just does not hold up in the end for me. Sadly, I believe I will be in the minority here, but I will say that I am learning that not every book is for everybody.
Thank you NetGalley and Grove Press for an Advanced Reader’s Copy of this book in exchange for an honest review.
Obsessed Bookaholic 