How a Woman Becomes a Lake begins like a lost woman mystery — a police officer finds an empty car idling with its doors open beside a frozen lake while responding to a woman’s call for help from the nearby payphone — but as author Marjorie Celona is a graduate of the Iowa Writers' Workshop who now teaches in the MFA Program at the University of Oregon, this modern “gone girl” trope is used with great intention to explore deeper themes of family dynamics, intergenerational trauma, grief, and loss. On the one hand, I can see that this wouldn’t be the twisty thriller that readers of the (apparent) genre would be looking for, and the sense that the writing is quite calculated and engineered keeps the characters at a bit of a remove, but Celona has a lot of interesting things to say about families, gender-based expectations, and relationships and I won’t fault her (too much) for allowing her craftsmanship to shine through. There's much more to love about the writing than merely like here.

Thank you NetGalley for this ARC of How a Woman Becomes a Lake
I was not sure what to expect from this novel. It grabbed me right away.
What in interesting insight and view from different characters perspectives of life, and family, live, relationships.
Such a deep, but simple look at life and death and everything in between
This novel is written from so many perspectives without being at all confusing
I honestly could not put this book down
Wow just wow!
Simplest way to explain the story is a dysfunctional family, Leo and Evalina, kids Jesse and Dimitri, father takes both children out for the day. Kids misbehave, father disciplines one child by leaving him in the park alone to think about his actions.
Family two, no children, Vera the wife takes off early morning  to walk her dog, never returns.  How these two events become entwined and affect the characters  lives.
The writing captures the reader from the beginning, just incredibly well written. I wanted the story to continue

Solid thriller. I had a visceral, physical reaction to the description of the initial moments on the icy lake with the brothers. Terrifying as a parent to relate to the father endlessly plunging his hands and reaching, reaching for the son who he believed to be lost in the icy waters.
Thank you

Thank you Netgalley and Penguin Random House Canada for a free copy of this book in exchange for an honest review. All thoughts and opinions expressed in this review are my own.

How A Woman Becomes A Lake is a dark, sad, dramatic work of fiction that will not be for everyone. Thankfully, I really, really enjoyed it. I would have to say this ended up being one of my favorite thrillers of the year.

I thought Celona's writing was absolutely magnificent. The way she was able to put me on an emotional roller coaster that kept me hooked on every page was wonderful. My heart was broken so many times throughout these pages. The characters were so incredibly flawed in a way that twists your emotions to make you feel multiple things for each character. The story is told through multiple person POV. I feel like each glimpse into their thoughts provided a layer of intrigue and interest to the story. I really just can't praise it up enough.

If you're looking for a dark mystery that will break your heart I'd recommend giving this one a try.

Slow burn, lyrical. The impact of failure by those you love.
You know the lake, feel the lake, smell the lake.
Definitely a more literary approach to crime fiction.

A beautifully written but ultimately very depressing story of family dysfunction, child abuse and the corrosive effects of grief and guilt.

A captivating story from the very beginning. Evelina and Leo are separated, but Leo takes his boys on a day trip to a lake at Squire Point. Jesse, the oldest is scared of his father and tries not to upset him. Dmitri is Leo’s favourite and Jesse is jealous. This particular day Jesse decides to play a trick on his father, the trick ends in disaster and changes their lives forever.
Vera and Denny, live in the same small fishing village. On New Years Eve, neighbours hear them arguing, Denny wants to go partying and Vera doesn’t. The next day Denny sleeps in, but Vera gets up and takes their dog Scout to Squire Point for a walk. There she meets a boy, all by himself and phones the police to let them know. The boy is shivering, the weather is very cold, and the lake is frozen. That very same day Vera disappears! Is there a connection?
It is a dramatic, heart wrenching story, with several twists and turns, especially when Leo, the detective, who first discovers Vera’s abandoned car, gets involved in their lives.
A quick engaging read, a literary thriller with psychological infusion. I could not decide between a 3.5 or 4, mainly because I thought it withered out towards the end.

I’ve seen How a Woman Becomes a Lake by Marjorie Celona listed as a thriller in a few different places, and went into this book expecting a wild ride. However, what I read wasn’t what I was prepared for at all. Instead of a story full of twists and turns, I found a beautifully written mystery about how the lives of a handful of characters unfortunately crossed.

For me, How a Woman Becomes a Lake fits more into the literary fiction genre than thriller. I think readers who expect something similar to popular titles will be let down. However, if you’re in the mood for a slow-burn mystery that focus more on characters than plot, you’ll be in for a treat.

The story takes place in a small town on the west coast, and starts on New Year’s Day. Two young boys are out with their father when another local woman goes missing. The characters seem to have nothing in common, until a police report shows that the missing woman called the boys’ mother right before she was reported missing. Immediately, everyone denies a connection, but throughout the book we see all of the pieces slowly come together.

As I mentioned, it’s not a fast paced book. Instead, it dives into the character’s lives and shows us their triggers, as well as what motivates them. Not everyone is who they appear to be at surface level, and there is something sinister hiding among them. The families are anything but perfect, but they move along, pretending that everything will be fine.

The author does a wonderful job of showing that seemingly good characters shouldn’t always be trusted, and even those painted as a villain can have some hope left in them.

For me personally, this wasn’t the type of book that I typically love, but the writing style and overall atmosphere kept me hooked. The story was, simply put, beautifully told. It has a cold setting, perfect for reading on winter nights. Curling up on my couch with a blanket and candle really made the reading experience for me.

I’d recommend How a Woman Becomes a Lake to readers who like slow-burn thrillers, similar to Emma Donoghue’s The Wonder.

Thank you to the publisher, Penguin Random House Canada, for sending me a digital copy of this book via NetGalley. How a Woman Becomes a Lake by Marjorie Celon is out now and can be purchased wherever books are sold.

It has been quite a while since I have been sucked into a book so quickly and completely. Marjorie Celona has a gift for crafting characters of great such interest and such depth that they seem to belong in the non-fiction section; their emotions and reactions have an amazing realism about them. They are not easy to let go of once you put the book down... or, perhaps, it is the characters holding onto you.

When a woman takes her dog for a morning walk at the lake in the morning on New Year’s Day, there are numerous directions, complete with various twists and turns the tale can take. These only increase in number when she finds a young boy standing in the snow, alone and freezing, and almost forces him into her car for warmth. Her gorgeous dog is an unwitting lure to the boy.

Neither of them knows at this point that the world is about to shatter and spin out of control in ways that nobody could have predicted. They will both be launched into a lifelong nightmare of silence, although for one of them, it will be all too short.

I honestly cannot see this title in the mystery genre, it is perhaps more fitting for thriller. It is a slow pace, but it is steady and unrelenting. I would highly recommend this title to those who like a good solid read! It kept me a little unbalanced throughout... just when you are sure you know what is coming - nope!

Born and raised on Vancouver Island, BC Canada, author Marjorie Celona’s debut novel, Y, won France’s Grand Prix Littéraire de l’Heroïne, and was nominated for the 2012 Scotiabank Giller Prize.

Thanks to NetGalley and Penguin Random House Canada for the ARC!

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This was an interesting read. This book was less about what happened to Vera and more about the dynamics of people and their relationships. I enjoyed the parts from Vera's point of view and really think they added something unique to the book.

I like that it leaves some things unanswered since I think that makes it more real. This story felt like it could have happened in real life. The characters were well fleshed out and developed. Not everyone was likeable or redeemable which is also real life. Not everyone has a happy ending. The theme of this book for me was "life goes on" and while the mystery surrounding Vera is important to the story, it is more about how people deal with life and what happens in it.

What an appropriate title.

This book follows Jesse, a young boy from a broken home, who is physically abused by his father. He lives in fear but still can't help but instigate the violence. He has a lot of strong emotions for such a young boy, and a lot of rage in his heart. On New Years day, he is at a park waiting for his father, a woman disappears, and we spend the rest of the book finding out what happened and why it happened.

Celona writes beautifully, it's almost poetic. She makes the reader feel deeply what she is trying to express. There are a lot of spiritual undertones in this book, like what happens when somebody dies? When someone is born? What happens to the soul?

There are also a lot of dark themes, death, suicide, abuse, just to name a few. What happens when people experience these kinds of traumatic events?

I recommend this book for someone who enjoys mystery or books about life and reality that we sometimes face.

Thank you to Penguin Random House Canada and NetGalley for the eGalley. All opinions expressed are my own.

I enjoyed reading this book. It had a good story to it. I liked the variety of characters in it. It was a well written book. I hope to read more books by this author.

I wish to thank NetGalley and Penguin Random House, Canada for the opportunity to read this book in return for an honest review. I regret that my reading experience was not more positive.

The book has been praised for its literary value and lyrical prose containing a mystery. During this unsettling time of COVID-19 lockdown and divisive political agendas, I was unable to connect with its dark gloomy themes and its damaged, broken characters. This unpleasant read had no joy, little redemption or resolution. I stayed with it to the end but was overwhelmed with all the grief, guilt, anger, fear and sadness.

The story was told from many viewpoints, everyone holding back or lying about what they knew. I felt that the narration by the dead woman while underwater or floating around in outer space added nothing except the macabre. I thought the conclusion to the mystery was distasteful. Prospective readers who enjoy a literary mystery should not be deterred by my personal misgivings and seek out reviews that were more positive.

I received a copy of this novel from the publisher via NetGalley.

4.5 * rounded up. This is beautifully written, full of complex, flawed characters. The mystery (such as it is) was reasonably obvious once you were about half way through the book, but by then you cared so much about the characters that you were more interested in them than plot development. I'm deducting half a star for the chapters from Vera's point of view, which struck me as a bit unnecessary. The ending was very good.

If you are looking for a more literary kind of The Lovely Bones then look no further. But for me this just didn't work.

I found that there were too many narrators and that I never became emotionally attached to any of them. They were also flawed but didn't necessarily exhibit growth that would have made that forgivable.

I thought I was getting something more along the lines of thriller, but I would almost classify this as straight literary fiction.

I didn't love it, but I hope that there is an audience out there who will.

This was the most unusual book that I have read in a while, in a good way. The story line was very unique and nothing like I have ever read before.

One day that changes the lives of six people, that started with a day trip for a father and his two sons to a park to let off paper boats with the one thing they wish for most to happen during the new year, from there things spiral out of control.

This book will leave you speechless

I loved this wonderful book! I liked the intimacy of it being set in a small fishing town. The characters are wonderfully complex. The events on that fateful winter's day has far ranging repercussions for all of the characters. I was shocked when I found out what had actually happened. The ending was a nice bookend to the story.

I was captivated by this author's voice right from the first paragraph. This is an immersive read, plunging us into the lives of everyone involved with the sudden death of an extraordinary woman and how that event affects each of them as their lives go forward. More than that, it takes us backwards, showing the relationships in each person's life prior to the tragedy and how these culminated as a perfect storm. Each character is drawn compassionately and achingly real. This is not a thriller: it's very much literary fiction but at the same time it's a compulsive page-turner. You can't help but feel for Vera and Denny, Jesse and Dmitri, and everyone else. They're all so finely drawn. I'd give this book ten stars if I could.

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Unfortunately, when I came to read this book, I couldn't find it anywhere on my device., even though my "shelf" indicates that I downloaded it on October 2nd. Since the book is now archived (Oct 14th), I can't try to download it again.

I have looked in Kindle, iBooks, and Book Shout. Is there another app that I should be using?

I'm so sorry that I didn't get to read this - or to leave a review.

Not so much of a thriller, more so a mystery, but you don't read it for the mystery, you read it to know how the mystery affects the people it concerns... It's not about the mystery, you can guess it within the first few chapters. It's about people and their flaws. Beautifully written, sometimes poetic, often viscerally realistic. This book was shockingly sad. All the characters felt very real. At about 60%, the story started to slow down, but it picked up again a few chapters later. The ending left us with some questions.. I'm not sure how I feel about it, but it was definitely a book worth reading.