Imagine seeing visions of yourself or those you love, knowing that what you are seeing cannot be real... Are you losing your mind? Are the visions you are seeing premonitions of something to come? Would you tell someone what you seen or would you fear they would think you are crazy?

This book was quite an interesting read for sure. We are introduced to many main characters - Ginny, Mark, Mr. Kells, Cass and Samara. All of them are connected in some way and know one another. Ginny is married to Mark. Their neighbours Cass (married new mother of one) and Samara (young woman who lost her mother) live close by. Samara took piano lessons from Mr. Kells wife years ago when she was alive. Mr. Kells is currently in the hospital, and his life was saved by Ginny, who is a surgeon. Mr. Kells is a professor and is Cass' mentor. Samara is a real estate agent tasked with trying to sell Mr. Kells home. All these characters lives are interconnected in some way and I found that a really interesting piece in the novel. What else do they have in common? They have all seen visions in the same small town they live in.

The premise of the novel is that they all get to view their lives in an alternate reality, hence the name of the novel - If, Then. I found it to be an interesting read and found myself wanting to know the whole point of the visions. What did the visions mean? And why were these people experiencing these visions? I thought it was an interesting and intriguing idea for a book. It kept me flipping through the pages to see what would happen next. It had a mystery and suspense type feel that I liked.

We have such a complex relationship with time. It adds value to our existence, but it is also something we waste, spending much of our lives in drifting states, trying to figure life out and sometimes, before we can, we reach the end. Most of the characters we meet in Day’s novel are in stasis mode. They are going through the motions of their day to day lives, stuck in the rut of routine, until they start seeing their doppelgangers, or the doubles of those no longer living. This knocks them from their static positions, forcing them to reconsider the paths they have chosen or deciding to forge new paths because of what they have seen.

If, Then follows the perspectives of four main characters: Ginny, Mark, Cass and Samara. Ginny and Mark are a married couple but despite this status, it is very clear that things haven’t been working out for some time. They parent their son Noah together, and it seems that this is the only space they share with each other, albeit reluctantly. Ginny is busy at her job as head of surgery, while Mark is trying desperately to be recognised in the work that he does. Instead of their doppelganger sightings bringing them together, it serves to push them apart. Ginny desires to seek out the images she sees, wanting the projected life more than the life she shares with her husband. Mark on the other hand, goes down a seemingly off-his-rocker path, a path laden with lies he tells his wife, the both of them burying what they have seen.

The character Cass finds herself struggling with her role as a new mother. Day’s portrayal of the sometimes isolating experience which new mothers face is so spot-on. To nurse, to care for, to be everything your newborn needs – the self you were before motherhood disappears into a vacant image you stare at but don’t know anymore. Before having her baby, she was a rising star in the academic world of philosophy, now the words she wrote swim before her eyes, lacking the comprehension they used to possess. Samara is lost in a different way. While her life belongs to her completely, she doesn’t know what to do with it. This stems from losing her mother as well as her inability to accept her mother’s death.

In a literary landscape overflowing with prose that uses the first person unreliable narrator, it is nice to have a third-person standard narrative like Day’s. She takes her time in painting all her characters’ lives in relation to each other, carefully leaving little clues for the readers to piece it all together. If this is a novel which functions on the reality of the multiverse, then how do we know all the characters exist in the same one? Of course by the end we find out everything, although it is infinitely more satisfying to have solved it before the end. My only issue is that in the process of making her novel accessible, this has rendered it slightly forgettable. It is something to enjoy in the moment, and then put aside once you are done.

Day’s novel reminds me of the movie Sliding Doors, a movie that charts how different our lives can turn out from the mere existence of one changed event. The message of If, Then is not to let these projections of “ifs” run our lives. Life will run its course, time will ensure that. All we can do is seize what we have of the now and make the best from the hand we are dealt. Maybe your path will take you to a place where you no longer love your husband, or bring you a deviation you did not account for. That’s okay, because sometimes, destruction can ironically be the thing you need to heal, to mend, offering clarity amidst the chaos, allowing you to see what you couldn’t before.

I really enjoyed this one. It was a windy, twisty tale of what-might-be's and I thoroughly enjoyed the back-and-forth in story lines - which I didn't even realize was happening until part-way through. To my mind, that's the hallmark of excellent storytelling - I was so immersed that I fell right into the narratives and the characters' lives. Some may find it confusing though, and I can see how. This is NOT a linear tale, and that style isn't for everyone.

Truth be told, it's usually not for me.

For some reason this one just worked for me though. It might be Hope Day's writing, which is clear and straightforward with a great balance of descriptive and narrative bits that keep the story moving without sacrificing explanation or explication when necessary. Perhaps it's the subject matter, which focuses heavily on the challenges of balancing motherhood with selfhood and of walking away from a career to take on a family - challenges I can certainly relate to. Perhaps it's the character of Ginny, who resonated with me from the opening of the story, or of Mark's panicky fear about protecting his child and family, which also resonated (although I'm pleased to report I've never gone *THAT* far - yet). Or perhaps it's the non-linear expression of life - which I also found oddly compelling and resonant. Whatever it was, I felt wholly engaged in the story and the lives being described from the opening pages and did not want it to end. I'm definitely adding Day to my author watch list!

Genre bending insight into non linear reality. Engaging characters that are easy to identify with, coupled with a story line that will keep you thinking about possibilities, long after it concludes..

This was a very unique and interesting book. It isn’t like many of the other books I usually pick up. I didn’t want to put the book down while I was reading it but in the end I wished it had all been tied together better. I wanted to know and understand more about the events that took place and the ending just wasn’t enough.

This novel just completely missed the mark for me. I was expecting a story with a sci-fi angle or even magical realism. It's set up to make it seem like there might be a parallel universe at play since the main characters start seeing people who aren't really there. However, this concept is never fully drawn out. I was super confused as to the purpose of this - was a natural disaster causing the disturbance? Were the 'others' supposed to be showing the characters different versions of themselves? The whole thing wasn't fleshed out so I was left guessing the whole time. I was also disappointed with the lack of a true plot. The only exciting things happened after 80% of the book was already done. I did think the characters were all interesting, and I liked the conflicts they were experiencing. I think I would have connected more to this book if it was a character study of how these individuals interacted rather than the unfinished idea of these visions they were having.

Who hasn't wondered how your life would be altered if only you had made one different choice? If, Then plays on that kind of wondering, as well as on the idea of the possibility of parallel realities. Could more than one version of ourselves exist? In If, Then we follow the lives of several neighbors in a quiet Oregon town who begin to have strange visions of themselves seemingly living other lives. It's a mind-bending, atmospheric read with a slow-building sense of tension and a strong visual quality that makes it easy to imagine this story translating well to the screen. The ending will leave you with a lot to talk about. Book clubs take note! Readers who enjoyed The Dreamers by Karen Thompson Walker will be likely to enjoy the moody, unsettling feeling of this narrative.

Where, oh, where do I begin? I finished this book several days ago, and have been rolling it over in my head ever since. So much so, that I’m debating going back and rereading the Entire. Book. Again.

Our story takes place in a quiet neighborhood at the base of a dormant volcano in Oregon. The neighbors are living normal lives...jobs, hobbies, children, love, grief. However, each person, unbeknownst to their fellow cul-de-sac residents, are having odd visions of their own lives and homes and families.

On a personal note, Samara’s storyline hit so close to home for me. Her visions, of course, revolve around seeing her mother, whom she has just recently lost. Samara learns a lot about her mother, and herself, while cleaning out her mother’s belongings. At one point, she talks to her father about particular things that had belonged to her mother as she cleans out the kitchen... “He picks up the box of mismatched Tupperware. ‘They’re just things, Sammy. They’re not her.’” As someone who has recently lost her own mother, the way that Day wrote Samara and how she was dealing with her grief was spot on. She perfectly captured what this emptiness feels like...what the grasping for one last piece of the person you lost feels like. One particular passage had me sobbing with understanding:
________________________
In her head her mother says, 'You don’t want that old thing, Sammy. There’s a chip on the bottom.' But Samara does want that old thing. It’s a portal to another moment in time. To a summer day on her parents’ back deck. To the sound of ice cubes clinking in a pitcher of lemonade, and the heat of the sun against the backs of her hands and the tops of her thighs. To the taste of sour and sweet, and the pressure of her mother’s cool fingers on her shoulder as she leaned over the table to pour her another glass.
________________________

There is so much I cannot talk about as it will completely give away many important pieces of the story. I will say, though, that if you like a hint of mystery, a bit of alternate reality, and a lot of the day-to-day dynamics of diverse families, then this is something you’re going to want to run to the bookstore to pick up. Immediately.

I wish I could give it more than 5 stars.

Thank you to Random House and NetGalley for this digital copy to read and review!

Available Now!

I absolutely loved Kate Hope Day's If, Then,. Set in a small, Oregon town on the edge of a (maybe not so) dormant volcano. As seismically, the town begins to shake, strange visions appear to the residents. Visions of things that cannot be, yet somehow also are. Worlds are bleeding into each other. What does that mean for the residents of this town, for their relationships and what does all this have to do with the dang volcano?

A bit on the trippy side, If, Then is an engaging read. Thorough all of the strangeness Day keeps her characters rooted in there relationships, in a way that is very engaging.

This book is exceptionally well crafted. I would recommend this book to fans of speculative fiction, or anyone who likes these "Sliding Doors"-type stores.

There are a lot of characters in this book to follow, something I'm not always a huge fan of reading. BUT it's a super cool premise where you get to see how each of these lives get portrayed based on the choices they make. I really enjoyed this one.

I was really intrigued at first by this novel, I'm always down for a little sci-fi/alternate reality reads.

But, unfortunately, I found myself 75% finished the novel and realized that nothing crazy exciting has happened through the whole book.

I didn't feel that it wrapped up many of the loose ends by the end of the novel, like why were Samaras parents still alive in Amar/Cass's reality, but not in Samaras. How did Cass have a boy in one reality, but already have Leah in the other? Why were they having visions? (Glimpses of the other reality??)

I did find this book to be a page turner because I got invested in the story, but believe a lot of missed ends definitely weren't tied up! Still 3 stars for keeping me intrigued!

This was a bit of a strange read. I wanted to like it based on the description a lot more than I actually did. It felt a little bloated, with certain parts really confusing to understand. I get that with some of the magical realism and shifting perspective that's to be expected, but it didn't feel executed very well. I ended it feeling dissatisfied.

BOOK REVIEW
IF, THEN
KATE HOPE DAY
Thank you to @randomhouse
@katehopeday @netgalley
for an advanced copy in exchange for an honest review.
If, Then is strangely intriguing. If I had made this choice, then this would have happened. Everyone thinks that sometimes. One little thing can change the course of an entire life. People in a small Oregon town actually witness themselves from time to time around town, only as different versions of themselves in imagined scenarios. The characters are privy to the reality of speculation and how certain choices would have affected the entire course of their lives. Can you imagine? There's my neighbor if....then, or there's my dead mother if...then, or there's me with a husband and kids, if...then? Seriously, it's straight up creepy yet absolutely fascinating. Well written, sharp and insightful, this story is layered with complexity in a unique and terrifying world. The premise is so original, and it's a captivating story from the first page to the last. I highly recommend not missing this one, especially if you've ever wondered what might have been.

If. Then is a very quiet and speculative story about four neighbors in Oregon who begin to see alternate versions of themselves. The premise hooked me from the beginning and wow does it deliver. It was an interesting and layered story full of well developed characters that were realistically flawed. The journey the characters make throughout the novel felt very nuance and left me craving for more.

Have you ever wondered what your life would be like if you had made different choices of if you were someone else? If, Then by Kate Hope Day gives readers the chance to explore this idea through "four neighbors who find their lives upended when they begin seeing themselves in parallel realities." In some ways, this novel was reminiscent of a science fiction novel. I liked the premise of the novel, but ultimately, I found myself wanting more. I think the author needed to flesh out the characters' lives a little more and there needed to be more focus on the characters. There were parts of the story that I wanted the author to explain more, and perhaps a longer story could have created that. Throughout the story, I felt like I wasn't really connecting with any of the characters, and there weren't many parts of the story that truly resonated with me. The construction of the suburban setting is convincing enough, and I found most of it to be an accurate description of suburbia. I felt like this novel had a lot of potential, but at the end, I felt unsatisfied and needing more. Thank you to the publisher and Netgalley for providing me with a free e-copy of this book to review. 3/5

If, Then, by Kate Hope Day, is a short but challenging novel about neighbors in a suburban Oregon neighborhood who suddenly start seeing visions of an alternate realities. These visions coincide with seismic rumblings of a close, presumably dormant volcanic mountain. The novel is beautifully written and raises questions about the choices we make and the consequences that follow. Simultaneously, and perhaps, contradictory, it also demonstrates how our choices falter and evaporate in the face of events beyond our control.

Nonetheless, some parts confused me because the timelines seemed out-of-sync. Was this a vision or not? The story has a misty, dream-like quality which I liked. Yet, I was not particularly satisfied with the conclusion. I suspect that was precisely the author’s intent. There is a lot to ponder in this novel, and it is worth a second read.

Thanks to NetGalley and Random House for giving me the opportunity to read an electronic ARC in exchange for an honest review.

3.5 stars, rounded up.

Thank you to Random House for my digital copy of this book!

If, Then is a speculative fiction work about a town in and its' inhabitants in Oregon. They began to see themselves in alternate realities and cannot understand what it means. When a disaster in nature occurs, they begin to understand

I enjoyed this book and loved getting to know the diverse characters. I enjoyed Kate Hope Day's writing style and the way is able to pull the reader in. I did feel that the beginning moved rather slowly. I also wish the disaster was not included in the synopsis because it doesn't happen until the end of the book. I kept waiting for it, so it was hard to fully immerse myself in the work. I think Day is a truly talented writer though, so I full intend to keep reading her books.

I would not recommend this book and had trouble getting through it. The first third was simple enough to read, second third more belaboring and third a relief that it would be ending somehow. It was a simple enough read to distract me from other daily things, but I felt it was time wasted.

This book certainly had an interesting and unique premise. It's speculative fiction meets science fiction meets domestic drama. Unfortunately, it didn't fully work for me. I didn't really grasp the overall theme and the ending left me wanting

I’m sure we’ve all wondering at some point about what our lives would be like in an alternative timeline, but what if you could unintentionally catch glimpses of that other life? “If my mother was still alive, then would I have stumbled upon her secrets?” “If I was married to someone else, then how different would life be?” These counterfactuals, among others, are explored in this debut novel by Kate Hope Day (out tomorrow! Thank you Random House for the free review ebook)
.
An interesting character study mixed with a dash of philosophy and science fiction, the structure, writing, and interconnected story really drew me into this quick read. If you loved “The Dreamers”, but wish it focused on 5 instead of 50 characters, you might enjoy this book.