A review by bayleaff
Whoever You Are, Honey: A Novel by Olivia Gatwood

4.75

Thank you to NetGalley and Random House Publishing Group for the digital ARC. I devoured this strange, gorgeously written story. The sci-fi elements mesh well with the overall lit fic tone, and some of the flashbacks tell me that Oliva Gatwood has got to have at least one amazing young adult book in her. I loved how well she captures the insidious nature of loneliness and how it can impact the way you interact with the world. The characters and the Santa Cruz/Arizona settings were so vivid, and the relationships all felt very believably messy and complicated. It was a little grislier than I expected, which I loved. It wasn't perfect — certain elements felt a little twee (not necessarily a bad thing) and the word "grin" was used about a thousand times — but I loved this book. It doesn't remind me of anything super specific, but it has elements of "Klara and the Sun" by Kazuo Ishiguro, maybe some Emma Cline, maybe some Melissa Broder. I'll def be preordering, and will probably re-read when it's published this summer.