The book was archived before our group could download it. We are sure that we would have enjoyed the book judging from the reviews it has received.

Heather, The Totality could have been one hell of a book if it had actually been a book, to begin with. I was drawn to this title because of the author Mathew Weiner, who is best known for creating Mad Man. He also wrote some of The Sopranos. Clearly, Matthew Weiner has quite the imagination which really suits TV. Heather, The Totality is very much my kind of story. I love true crime, I am pretty obsessed with it if I am completely honest so this was perfect for me, well it should have been perfect for me. The problem is that this book is so short and so rushed that there is barely a book at all. There was not enough time in engage in the storytime, or to relate to the characters. What should have been a marathon of tension, ended up being a short-lived and disappointing sprint to the finish line.

Very unpleasant characters playing out a dangerous game to the end - a teen girl and a psychopathic criminal brush up against each other. Clever but ultimately didn't engage me.

This was a good read, but for some reason, I didn't feel fully absorbed with the story. I couldn't take to any or the characters either. A great premise though and something slightly different. It could just be that it wasn't my taste.

Starts of promisingly, full of Weiner's trademark characterisation and observations. Unfortunately it rambles (no mean feat for a novella) towards a shambolic ending that just seems to pander to male inadequacies. You could argue that's Weiner's stock angle in his writing (have you met Don Draper and Tony's Soprano?) but for someone who writes such strong females, this is awfully one sided.
Is done have an issue with the second-person narrative, and it's a refreshing change, but with characters as complex as this, it feels jarring at times.

I enjoyed this short story. It was well written and gave an interesting, realistic insight in family relationships. I didn't find this book underwhelming like some other reviews. This is definitely the example when less is more...
Many thanks to Netgalley and the publishers for the ARC.

The Breakstone family – well-established, wealthy, successful. Father Mark and mother Karen fuss over their perfect daughter Heather; they’re like two planets orbiting around the sun. And then there is Bobby – under-privileged, raised at the bottom of society, a criminal, damaged.
These two parties move towards each other like two trains and it is clear from the start that it’s not going to end well

I did enjoy the book but I found it curiously cold. Weiner hasn’t got much compassion for any of his characters and as a reader I felt I was being kept at arm’s length. It’s a tense and chilly read and hard to put down.

Funny and easy to read, the characters were appealing

A small book but very neatly packaged. The story started out fairly gently but built up to a fairly menacing finale. It had its flaws but on the whole, it was a promising debut from an author more used to writing television scripts.

A strange one. I was really looking forward to reading this and found it ok, but not brilliant. I couldn’t find the characters engaging so wasn’t particularly concerned with what happened. I presume I must have been missing the point. At least it was a quick read.

This is a very short novel about a family in New York. Karen and Mark marry and give birth to Heather, as she hits the mid-teen years the friction of becoming a young adult conflicts with her parents fragmenting marriage. When a murderer with paedophilic tendencies fixates on Heather things spin out of control.

Man Men creator Mathew Weiner expertly creates the life of the characters succinctly in such a sort piece. I feel the story may have benefitted from being presented within a collection of short stories rather as a stand alone novella. Thanks to Canongate and Netgalley.

This is an unusual book - a novella, really - which is reminiscent of a fairy tale. Matthew Weiner’s story is about Mark and Karen, a couple who meet and marry later in life and have Heather - the apple of their collective eye.

Heather is brought up in relative luxury in the family’s Manhattan apartment. It’s clear that Karen’s life IS Heather - but Heather resents this, instead favouring her father, Mark. Later, a parallel story is introduced with Bobby, a down-at-heel construction worker from New Jersey who is part of a team working on the family’s apartment.

Bobby’s murderous intentions don’t go to plan which is a huge relief. However, what happens right at the end of the novella is a little far-fetched but also quite cinematic. It isn’t particularly surprising that Weiner, writer of blockbuster series such as The Sopranos and Mad Men, wrote this story. Okay, there isn’t any dioalogue, apart from the odd line late in the story; and, the structure is quite simplistic with the prose is spare. Despite this, the story is gripping and disturbing and one can’t help questioning what will end up happening to Heather, the interestingly-named Totality.

Published yesterday in the UK and written by the creator of Mad Men, this very short novel (144 pages) packs a lot in. I thought it was an excellent study of a mother and father and their relationship with their daughter, the enigimatic Heather, who is only really seen through the eyes of her parents, and who doesn’t seem very likeable to be honest! But she is a product of the wealth and privilege she’s raised with.
I’ve read very mixed reviews about this one, probably because most people are familiar with Mad Men, so have a certain expectation, but I’ve never watched Mad Men, so had no expectations! I thought it was a skillfully written novel, with interesting (if a tad unbelievable) characters. And the ending! 😱

Tense and deadpan in God's-eye journalistic style, Heather, The Totality is a spare and sparse hypnotic story about people tumbling helplessly towards irrevocable breakdown. The storytelling is almost cold and distant as it rummages through the characters' lives, past and present, but the view of the characters is close-up and personal, delving into their most private thoughts, real and perceived.

I admit that I couldn't put this down for love or money (or even sleep) once I'd started, its pacey telling pulled me in and wouldn't let go. I started and finished it in the same evening, and stayed up till the small hours to find out what happens in its satisfying, if bleak, denouement.

Mark and Karen Breakstone have produced, by sheer luck, a pleasant daughter, Heather, whose sheltered and comfortable life as the centre of her devoted, doting parents' affections has moulded her into someone quite special; her carefree, luxurious existence has endowed her with the ability to empathise with other people without judgement, and to imbue her, in adolescence, with a desire to help those less fortunate than herself and her parents – which, in her quite privileged place in the social and economic hierarchy of New York, is almost everyone.

But her sunny disposition and youthful beauty draws the attention of more sinister people, against whose covetousness of her attractiveness and good fortune she is unprepared, having lived in the gilded and often suffocating cage of her parents' affections all her life.

Heather The Totality is a fairly short novel, at 144 pages, but it is absolutely perfectly formed, and its fast pace and sinister, unblinking, impassive irony gives a deceptive weight to deeper issues of parenting, rich-poor divide, opportunities and sheer bloody good – and bad – fortune. Weiner has crafted a novel that is far more than a simple tale of family life, and examines in an uncomfortable light the polar ends of the spectrum of fortune and misfortune, and the tragedy that ensues from such divides.

Many thanks to the publisher, Canongate, for a review copy of Heather, The Totality via NetGalley

This was more like a short story rather than a book. I was disappointed that there wasn't more to it as I think the fundamental issue of obsession, either parental or sexual, would make a very interesting book. Having said that, I quite enjoyed the characters and the various voices but, call me greedy, I wanted more.

This was quite a short book so it was an easy read. For me, the writing style was a bit clunky and the ending seemed quite rushed but I did enjoy it. Although I found the characters interesting, they would have benefitted from being developed a bit further. I would have loved to have known more of their backstory and what has made them the way that they are.

3 stars.

I expected more from this book, and perhaps that's why I was so disappointed. I felt no connection to the story and didn't care about the characters.

A little gem of a book with parallel stories of privilege and poverty which colliding a violent incident. There is a vague sense of unease and unfulfilled lives throughout and a lack of real emotion from any of the characters. An unsettling read which I really enjoyed!

Manhattan financier Mark Breakstone is successful enough at his job, but he seems destined never to reach the top echelon. Nevertheless, when he's introduced by friends to Karen she sees sufficient potential to throw in her lot and soon they are married and living in a nice apartment close to Park Avenue. Not too much later a beautiful and seemingly gifted daughter, Heather, is born. So adorable is their offspring that it isn't long before her parents are actively competing for her affections.

In a parallel storyline we’re introduced to Bobby Klasky. His life is not so blessed. Brought up in Newark by a heroin addict mother, Bobby finds trouble easily. A series of escalating crimes follows, rounded off by a stretch of prison time. He’s going to be trouble, is Klasky.

It's clear that the paths of Klasky and the Breakstones will cross. It's equally certain that it’ll end badly. But how will they cross and just how badly will it end? You don't have to wait long to find out as this is very short novel - designed, I think, to be read in one sitting. As the tension is wound up I found myself inventing any number of endings, though not the one that eventually transpired.

I was attracted to the book by the fact that it's written by the creator of the brilliant television series Mad Men. Well this is nothing like the series… or is it? As some others have observed, there is a sense of moral ambiguity regarding the actions taken by the characters, which leads to a somewhat conflicted view as to who is the good guy and who’s the baddie here. For anyone who has watched episodes of Mad Men and witnessed the activities of Don Draper and Roger Sterling, you'll recognise this. The tension is well ramped up through the tale and I liked the flow of it, with its relative lack of dialogue. Worth catching.

To begin with, this is like reading two separate books, one about a life of privilege, and one of abuse. Heather is the central cog around which her mother and father revolve. She is beautiful, intelligent and empathetic. Both of her parents are obsessed with her in their own ways. Bobby grows up poor, neglected and abused. His inner monologue is a very strong voice in the book, and we soon understand that he is completely out of whack with the rest of the world. The stories eventually collide and entwine, with a violent outcome (don't want to give any spoilers). This is a short book, and quickly read, almost like a treatment for a longer novel, but satisfying in its brevity.