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doomkittiekhan 's review for:
The Regrets
by Amy Bonnaffons
"Just try to pretend it was ever possible to hold yourself together - that death wasn't always licking at the edges of your life, that the worms and maggots weren't already snapping at the sweet scent of your flesh, that time wasn't eating your pussy with its barbed tongue, that the shit and blood passing out of your body, which you flush away without even looking, was not always a reminder that your body never belonged to you; it was always already disintegrating, leaking, provisional, on loan, from the kingdom of bone and snail and ash. You've enjoyed your flirtation with death; you've enjoyed your round of slumming in this metaphysical ghetto. But you've forgotten something: for me this is no flirtation. This death is the only life I have left. And I will not be abandoned. I can swallow you whole."
The Regrets is Amy Bonnaffons first novel-length project, and I knew after reading [b:The Wrong Heaven|36546654|The Wrong Heaven|Amy Bonnaffons|https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1511291691l/36546654._SY75_.jpg|58278228] in 2018 that The Regrets would be an automatic purchase. Bonnaffons' writing is weird and wonderful and I knew that any story with a premise like that promised in The Regrets would have much more lurking under the surface...and I was not disappointed.
Split between two primary narrators, Thomas and Rachel, we see the evolution of a romantic relationship. The first blush of flirtation, the inevitable falling together, and the eventual disillusion. The catch is that Thomas is dead. With her characters in place, Bonnaffons performs an autopsy on relationships taking the 'meet cute' trope and exorcising it, thus making The Regrets a thinly veiled metaphor for toxic relationships...and yet, also, showcasing everything that can be magical, tender, and lovely about love. This is a genre-jumping, wild story. It's philosophical, beautifully dark, and haunting.
The Regrets is Amy Bonnaffons first novel-length project, and I knew after reading [b:The Wrong Heaven|36546654|The Wrong Heaven|Amy Bonnaffons|https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1511291691l/36546654._SY75_.jpg|58278228] in 2018 that The Regrets would be an automatic purchase. Bonnaffons' writing is weird and wonderful and I knew that any story with a premise like that promised in The Regrets would have much more lurking under the surface...and I was not disappointed.
Split between two primary narrators, Thomas and Rachel, we see the evolution of a romantic relationship. The first blush of flirtation, the inevitable falling together, and the eventual disillusion. The catch is that Thomas is dead. With her characters in place, Bonnaffons performs an autopsy on relationships taking the 'meet cute' trope and exorcising it, thus making The Regrets a thinly veiled metaphor for toxic relationships...and yet, also, showcasing everything that can be magical, tender, and lovely about love. This is a genre-jumping, wild story. It's philosophical, beautifully dark, and haunting.