This was an extremely bittersweet book, and really made me think about change and how the world just keeps moving on. If you're looking for a tender, introspective read with an interesting cast of characters, then this is the book for you.

As a once-bustling mall prepares to shut its doors for the final time, the residents of an upstate New York town must reckon with a shocking act that forces them to reevaluate who they are and what they want
I laughed, I cried, I wanted to shake some of these characters, but equally, I wanted to hold them in my embrace and tell them - everything WILL be okay. Even when it's not. I hesitate to give much more away, as I believe this book is best read cold, so to speak! Read it!!!

This story covers many topics around race, growing up, work vs dreams, anger/obsession, grief and redemption. At its heart it's a tender story around human connection and how complete strangers can make deep and meaningful differences in your life!

Thank you to netgalley and Catapult, Counterpoint Press, and Soft Skull Press for an advanced copy in exchange for an honest review.

This story brings together a list of characters connected by a mall in upstate New York. There's a white bookstore manager and his black wife and biracial children who live in a tiny home he built for them to live with minimum belongings. There's an Asian hair stylist single mother who secretly dreams of being an artist and whose son is into magic tricks. There's a teenager who works at the mall and dreams of being an actress and the boy who is obsessed with her. And an old widow who lives next door to the biracial couple and gets her hair cut at the mall.

All of these characters' lives weave in and out of each other as they navigate their lives and try to live and survive as the rumors of the mall closing turn out to be true.

This story covers many topics around race, growing up, work vs dreams, anger and obsession, grief and redemption. At its heart it's a tender story around human connection and how complete strangers can make deep and meaningful differences in your life.

with gratitude to netgalley and Catapult, Counterpoint Press, and Soft Skull Press for an advanced copy in exchange for an honest review.

I spent much of my childhood at the mall so the world of this book and its inhabitants felt very familiar. Change is never easy but it was fun to see this group of oddballs pull together. Cute, quirky Spring fiction.

You Are Here
A Novel
by Karin Lin-Greenberg
Description
As a once-bustling mall prepares to shut its doors for the final time, the residents of an upstate New York town must reckon with a shocking act that forces them to reevaluate who they are and what they want

This was a bittersweet book. I thoroughly loved the characters. It had parts that made me smile, and laugh and broke my heart. I was invested in how these people were so real and life intersects in the mall and into their personal lives. LOVE it so much, until it ended.

A debut that drew me right in.,so well written characters that come alive.Sei in an American mall where neighbors lives intersect.I was so entertained so involved an author to follow.#netgalley #youarehere

YOU ARE HERE by Karin Lin-Greenberg is a fantastic novel that - on it's surface - is about how the closing of a suburban mall affects a diverse group of folks in upstate NY, vaguely set a few years in our past. I wanted to read the book based on that concept alone, so I was thrilled to be rewarded with a bittersweet ode to the resilience of the human spirit.

I laughed, I cried, I wanted to shake some of these characters, but equally, I wanted to hold them in my embrace and tell them - everything WILL be okay. Even when it's not. I hesitate to give much more away, as I believe this book is best read cold, so to speak. There were some instances of melodrama that rang false to me, hence the four stars, but overall I really enjoyed the read. Thanks to NetGalley and Counterpoint for the ARC.