Thank you to Netgalley and the publisher for granting me free access to the advanced digital copy of this book.

Multiple generations of a family, all of whom have some professional connection to glass. Nice throughline!

I was unable to read and review this before the publication date, however, I will be reading it soon and updating this with my honest review. Thank you so much to Netgalley for an advanced reader copy of this book, I appreciate it!

This book was so incredibly interesting. I loved the way it shifted generations but maintained connection. My only complaint was that I wished each protagonist had one more chapter, just so I could know more.

This felt like 3 different books and we didn't spend enough time with any of the characters to learn about backstories, motivations, relationships, etc. So as a reader I was left feeling disjointed about this book, confused, and bored. It had such a great premise but lacked any sort of coherent direction in storytelling and little conviction. I am sad. I wanted to love this but it was not the book for me.

An extraordinary debut exploring family connections through the medium of glass.
Olivia Wolfgang-Smith's novel Glassworks is an incandescent debut that follows the lives of four people on the brink of metamorphosis. We first meet Agnes in 1910, a wealthy young woman eager to commission glass teaching models of plants for her university's biology department. She hires Czech artist Ignace for the job, luring him away from his home country in spite of the university board's reluctance, with consequences neither character can anticipate. The plot then skips to 1938, shifting to the story of Agnes' son, 18-year-old Edward, as he struggles to find his place in the world. Another jump moves the action forward to 1986 where 47-year-old Novak finds herself taking care of her elderly, disabled father, while simultaneously trying to give her own life shape and meaning. And lastly, we meet Flip, who in 2015 can't seem to find love and acceptance even within her own family.

The book reads like four interconnected, sequential novellas. With each new section, the perspective changes completely and the voice that was the focus of the preceding chapter is silenced. The connecting thread between them is glass, with each character's life revolving around the medium in some way (e.g., Edward seeks to work in the stained-glass industry while Novak washes the windows of New York's skyscrapers). But glass also serves as a metaphor for each of their lives; it's a material that can be shaped into objects of great beauty and resiliency, yet it's fragile—something that can be shattered by ill-treatment. It can be clear or opaque, cool or warm, simple or complex. We see all its many attributes reflected through the lives of Agnes, Edward, Novak and Flip.

The author brilliantly explores complex themes through her characters, in particular discussing questions of family—who is our family? What do we owe them, and what do they owe us? Glassworks shows how little adult children understand about their parents. At one point Edward sits in Boston's Carter Plaza wondering if his parents ever saw it, not knowing his mother's family commissioned it. He thinks to himself, "They hadn't even had to try…If they had, they'd understand how it felt to struggle, or to worry about impressing the right people." Readers know from the previous section that nothing could be farther from the truth, and this gulf between parent and child feels at once familiar and heartbreaking. The book also touches on ideas of hardship and resiliency. Discussion of topics such as spousal abuse, mental health, alcoholism and the AIDS crisis question how we react to adversity—will we overcome it, or be buried by it?

In addition to a marvelously multi-layered plot, Wolfgang-Smith's characters are drawn superbly, and her prose is as luminous as the glass about which she writes. There are resonances scattered throughout, echoes readers intuit but of which the characters themselves are oblivious (Novak loves a window she's working on because it's "cloudy with life like a turbid sea" while Edward's favorite stained glass evokes the waters around Noah's ark). This novel is as close to perfect as any I can recall; I'm astonished this is the author's debut work.

My only caveat about the book is that each section ends rather abruptly, generally in the midst of a crisis. One character may have died at the end of their chapter, for example, and readers don't know that person's fate until a casual mention many pages later. I have never encountered a novel with so many unresolved plotlines. Normally that would be a deal-breaker for me (I confess I like my plots wrapped up neatly). However, in the context of this novel the technique really works, emphasizing the disconnect between generations. It serves to highlight what a remarkable author Wolfgang-Smith is; the book really knocked my socks off.

In short, I can't recommend Glassworks highly enough. Readers looking for a well-written work of literary fiction – particularly those hoping for something a little different – will definitely want to put this one on their list. It would also make an excellent choice for book groups.

Glassworks by Olivia Wolfgang-Smith is a new novel that focuses on four generations of a family that is at least marginally related to glassworks. The novel is well written and touches on many issues that will interest readers. I struggled a bit with the likability angle of some of the characters and it's depressing (albeit real) to see subsequent generations be less well off. The author's prose is engaging even when I wasn't drawn to the characters. All in all a good read.
Thanks to NetGalley and the publisher for an advance copy of this book in exchange for an honest review. Glassworks is available now.

DRC provided by Bloomsbury USA, Bloomsbury Publishing via NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.

Olivia Wolfgang-Smith's writing delighted me. I was captivated from start to finish.

Olivia Wolfgang-Smith has gifted readers with a beautifully written, compelling queer story that spans generations. The way the generational stories in GLASSWORKS unspool is a masterclass in writing a novel that covers such a big range of time. Will be recommending this one to all of my students who read and write historical fiction.

Beautifully written emotionally involving a family saga each section was so well written.A book I will be recommending the characters come alive drew you in.

4.5 stars rounded down.

As a giant fan of sprawling family dramas and of queer books (and, um, reality shows about glass art), this was one that i was really excited to read. 4 generations of a family defined queerly. The great loves in it aren't the ones they are supposed to be. Generations don't happen how they are expected. Inheritance is messy and full of grief and no one knows how to care for each other in a way that is legible to their beloveds. There is so much forgetting and things keep getting passed on anyway.

I could not stop reading this book. I honestly wish it had been longer because i wanted more of everyone in it. Some of the other reviews talk about everyone being unlikeable but i honestly didn't find that? This doesn't feel like a book of anti-heroes, people who are terrible and that's the point of them. It feels like a book of people living with pain and trying to figure out how to show love without having felt it, and messing up over and over and trying again anyway. Love without models feels like such an essentially queer experience and seeing it throughout the book felt really compelling to me--and seeing, in each story after the first, the ways that each generation tried to love before, how they tried to learn it and show it and still fell apart, made the failures and attempts feel even more heartwrenching.

Four generations linked by glass (and, oddly, pineapple). This is a beautifully written and subtle novel that at times seems to be meandering until you realize what's happening. Agnes inherited from her aunts- inherited enough to indulge her love of botany and glass. She brings Ignace Novak to the US to create glass models for the (unnamed) and falls in love. Problem is that she's married to a horrible man but she manages to escape that marriage. Edward is the neglected son of Agnes and Ignace who is fascinated with a Children's Bible and who finds himself over his head as an apprentice at a glass concern. He meets Charlotte, whose family is, ahem, well connected and their child Novak becomes a window cleaner who falls for Cecily, a minor actress on Broadway. Cecily's daughter Flip finds the small bee made all those years ago by Ignace and so much more. This reveals its pleasures slowly as you make connections between the generations. There's much quiet drama and tragedy but also love. It's an unusual read, to be sure, but one well worth your time. Thanks to Netgalley for the ARC. Highly recommend.

Intricately crafted and deeply human, Glassworks was a book I wanted to savor every moment of. The gorgeous prose brought four generations of messy yet lovable characters to life. Although Novak was definitely my favorite, I found something to relate to in each protagonist.
I would absolutely recommend this to anyone searching for a character-driven multigenerational saga, but be prepared for the pacing to drag a little, especially towards the beginning. My only qualm with Glassworks was that the ending was very open and didn't wrap up any of the previous story threads (which I had expected it to based on the blurb). Once the narrative moves to the next generation, you get very few updates on the previous ones.

Glassworks is a queer novel that spans across multiple generations,

I’ll be honest, (like always), I hate that this novel is so new, because I found myself wanting to look up a detailed synopsis of what was happening at time. For instance, there was a point where one of the MC’s accosts someone and I wasn’t sure if there was a SA insinuation or not. I read it several times. I also found my kind drifting off during certain detailed descriptions and couldn’t get the full picture.

This novel had good bones, and there’s a certain person that would love this, it just wasn’t for me right now.

Thank you NetGalley & Bloomsbury Publishing for giving me a copy of this ARC. All opinions are my own,

This was beautifully written, and I cared about all the stories. It was hard to read about so many generations being miserable and getting progressively poorer, but I think there was a bit of hope at the end.

Glassworks is a stunning multi-generational family story that examines the fragility of connection and emotion through the motif of glass. Beginning with Agnes's story in 1910, the novel traces one family's tragic past, a tragedy that revolves so much around the aches of longing and loving and feeling insufficient even when so much love is there. It is a painful and beautiful consideration of humanity's need for connection.

Wolfgang-Smith's prose is gorgeous, full of sentences that made me want to pause and soak them in, and the characters in each time period were complex and different and worthy of the space they embodied in the novel.

This was a wonderful debut! Thanks to Bloomsbury for the galley!

This novel defies description. It’s a massive, often thrilling, utterly unpredictable novel about glass, relationships, mistakes, and the search for involvement. Its opening section was, for me, the most compelling, inhabiting its historical setting with confidence and originality. Subsequent sections are less immersive and the last two perhaps the weakest. The novel aches for a stronger editorial hand, that would have curbed some of the excess and pulled the book towards a tighter shape. Nevertheless, this is impressive work and the author has significant potential, just needs better shaping.

I enjoyed Glassworks, the book travels through the generations and the eras of history while entwining the characters and their lives.
While some parts were poignant and engaging, I felt that some were a little disconnected. Some ends were tied up and others not which I don’t mind.
I would recommend Glassworks and I have ordered it for the library.

Oh, look at that. Looks like I’m the first person to properly (extensively) review it. Ok then…
A serious literary novel through and through, Glassworks follows four generations of the same family connected by blood and circumstance. A heavy multi-generational drama featuring a variegated cast of characters. Not of who are particularly happy. But complex, and that’s what one most likely wants in serious literary fiction.
Most auspicious debut, this novel features some first class writing and it makes the story and its characters come alive in the most vivid ways. But then again, it’s heavy and not just in its page count/volume/weight, but in the way spending close to 400 pages with a bunch of profoundly unhappy and not overwhelmingly likeable characters can be.
Besides we only et so much time with each. The novel spans four generations, so just as you get into one story, it ends and propels you forward in time. And sure, the old characters get revisited still directly and indirectly, through flashbacks and memories and side appearances, but it isn’t quite the same.
And while the characters’ fallibility is rendered exceptionally, the sheer volume of it eventually weighs the novel down. Mind you, I don’t mind sad or tragic stories, but something about this novel was ever so slightly…oppressing. Just one devastation after another as all these people are scrabbling through life that doesn’t seem to offer much. All these private quiet devastations. And the stubborn determination to go on anyway. I suppose there’s something admirable about that. But also profoundly Sisyphean.
At any rate, a very well written novel. Moving, poignant, depressing. Not the sort fo thing to easily recommend, but worthy. Thanks Netgalley.

I really enjoyed each little novels in the story but the end was the best. I found the characters charming and their stories called out to the sadness held within us all.