Oh maaaaan I hope this book reaches the audience it deserves. It was weird and trippy and introspective and I loved it. The author absolutely nails the feral, swampy atmosphere of Florida right now both physically and politically. As someone who practically grew up there and am very familiar with its current political and social climate, this was spot on. The only almost-negative I could see is some people wishing that more of the speculative elements were more developed, but I think it would have made the pacing of the rest of the book feel wonky. It did delve more into the themes of navigating mental health issues and trauma than I expected, so if that is something that is a potential trigger, I’d keep that in mind. That being said this was my type of literary fiction and I really enjoyed this!

Thanks to Netgalley and FSG for the ebook. A ghostwriter for thrillers, moves, with her husband, back to the small Florida town of her youth during the pandemic. She moves in with her mother and with her sister next door. Everyone deals with the pandemic in their own ways. Her husband runs miles and miles every day, her sister loses herself in a virtual reality game, her mother starts a cult that advocates the extinction of the human race. The ghostwriter is challenged by her employers to write an original story. She decides to write about the time she was institutionalized when she was a teen. And things get odder and odder from there in this funny and wild ride.

I've loved Laura van den Berg's work for years, and her latest did not disappoint. The novel tells the story of a ghostwriter who moves back home to Florida during the pandemic, then *things* happen. For one, there's the VR tech that makes people act oddly. Our narrator's sister is an avid user, often encountering their dead father in this virtual world. The state in general seems to be going through an upheaval. There's also the narrator's stay at the Institute when she was younger. The novel has speculative elements that I won't totally spoil, and which are situated close enough to our present to feel almost real, possible. The chapters have a diaristic feel (the novel was once called Florida Diary, which is mentioned in the text), and the characters are perfectly idiosyncratic. I loved spending time in this world, devoured this book in nearly one sitting.

Thanks to the publisher for the e-galley!

A whirlwind, a rollercoaster, a crazy train and maze of mirrors.

The ghostwriter is our protagonist, and she has returned to Florida with her husband post Covid to assist her mother. Her father has recently died, her sister lives next door and her husband is struggling as he continues to try to complete a book on Pilgrims. Van Den Berg punctures each paragraph with insights that are hard to argue yet sometimes also hard to swallow.

The Ghostwriter is stuck, she hasn't moved on from her stint in a mental institution after high school, and she never made peace with her family. She is now in her childhood home writing ridiculous thrillers for famous named-authors. When a storm hits and her sister goes missing, the world is truly put on it's end and we are all forced to deal with what is actually happening in the world today.

It's a carefully wrought crazy burst of sanity, this is the ride you need to take - Read States of Paradise!
#fararstruss&giroux #lauravandenberg #stateofparadise