A very different story than what I was expecting. Somehow for such a unique storyline of a man turning into a shark in real time, it was surprisingly boring? I didn't find the character development I was looking for and didn't find the love between the characters that I was hoping to feel. Maybe just the wrong writing style or choices for my particular tastes.

This was a very weird, strange, and beautiful book. It takes place in a world where some people manifest animal mutations and turn into that animal. Wren and Lewis are newly married when he learns he's turning into a shark. The book also tells the story of Wren's mom.

The book is full of beautiful writing in several different styles - some written like a play or poetry and short 1 page chapters. It was unique but wonderful. I really enjoyed it.

I absolutely loved this book!! I couldn’t put it down.
I just loved all the characters. I highly recommend this book.

Happy pub day to a book I haven’t stopped thinking about.

Shark Heart is a love story with a speculative angle that becomes so tangible through Habeck’s writing that I forgot it was fantastical at all.

With rich metaphors of metamorphosis, and what it can feel like to move through love, life, grief and pain I was completely enraptured by the whimsical and emotional journey of Lewis and Wren.

If you can suspend reality awhile and dive into a story that although written in an almost poetic way is beautiful and filled with the kind of prose to turn any cynic into a romantic.

The way I've been OBSESSING over this book ever since I saw the cover is unreal. SADLY, and it pains me to say this, I was a bit underwhelmed. :( I do have to give the author 10/10 for a creative premise - a newlywed couple's life plans get turned upside down when Lewis is diagnosed with a genetic condition that has his body slowly turning into a great white shark (literally!!).

Perhaps this was supposed to be a metaphor for living with chronic illnesses or any number of other disabilities? In that sense I did enjoy how Lewis's wife, Wren has to put her life on hold and basically become a caregiver for her husband and his odd condition, foregoing plans of motherhood.

What I didn't love (and it's possible this was an audiobook problem) was the way the story alternated POVs a LOT and switched back and forth in time. It was almost two stories in one as we follow Wren in the present AND her mother in the past as she went through her own metamorphosis into a Komodo dragon.

In any case, this was a very thought-provoking and original book with memorable characters and surprisingly relatable events despite the bizarre plot. This would make a great book club book and I will probably read it again in print to see if that format works better for me. Many thanks to NetGalley and the publisher for an early digital copy in exchange for my honest review!

I loved this book so much. Tender, weird, and heartfelt, it focuses mainly on Wren and Lewis, a newly wedded couple who have to deal with Lewis’ diagnosis that he is turning into a great white shark. The world building was incredible — some people are born with mutations that turn them into animals, others can give birth to animals directly. Even though it was an out there concept, the book felt centred on humanity and love. Habeck gives every character a chance. The structure of the book was interesting and worked well, bouncing around timelines in a way that was easy to follow, and incorporating different structures of writing. I liked that at its core, it still focused on Wren, offering screenshot moments of her younger days and building up into who she is now. The epilogue was sweet and heartwarming, slightly too much of an almost perfect ending, but overall I thought it was an incredibly built up and well executed book with a unique idea.

A fabulous blend of genres with a great deal of heart and weirdness, Shark Heart is an utter delight.

This book is a love story through and through, but it’s also a meditation on grief and moving on and shattered expectations. It’s about finding love and losing it and about how it truly is better to have loved and lost than never have loved at all. It’s a weird novel that’s not too weird, a love story that is not a Romance, and it’s magical realism but just barely.

The fun thing about the novel is that we get no explanation for why people (it’s not just Lewis) sometimes mutate into animals. It's just an accepted (albeit dreaded) disease in this world. In this way, it’s not a sci-fi, as it’s not based on science; it’s more fantasy.

It’s also a quirky novel that manages to balance serious topics (such as abuse and death and lost friendship) with light humour and emotion. It also has these itty bitty chapters, so I just flew through the thing. Some chapters are written as plays, which tied into the story and helped speed through the more mundane aspects of the plot.

The characters were great - Wren, Lewis, and Angela are fully fleshed-out individuals with goals, dreams, and hobbies. All wrestle with different issues (aside from and as well as the animal mutation thing) that felt realistic and relatable. I cared about all their fates, and Lewis and Wren’s situation was quite heartbreaking.

In truth, I can’t say much else about it without going into spoilers, so if you want something a little sad, somewhat meditative, subtle about its themes (disability is definitely in there), and weird in a great way, you should definitely check it out. A real surprise hit for me. Also, the cover is lovely.

[arc review]
Thank you to NetGalley and Simon & Schuster Canada for providing an arc in exchange for an honest review.
Shark Heart releases August 8, 2023

Wren and Lewis are newlyweds, and over the course of 9 months, he fully mutates into a great white shark.

The premise here was so intriguing and wildly original.

I loved Wren’s characteristics from the first page they were described. I wasn’t expecting to feel so seen in such an immediate and upfront way.

The chapters were choppy, terse, and nonlinear, but it somehow (just barely) worked. Though I can see how it wouldn’t appeal to everyone.
The stylistic writing choice of it partly being presented as a screenplay showed the allegory of Lewis being a theatre teacher and this being the performance of his lifetime.
It’s also written in verse at times, so no, Shark Heart is not your “traditional” novel with structure that you’re used to, but that’s also what makes it so unique.

Where this confused me was when part two was introduced, and we got the perspective of Wren’s mother when she was 15 years old, pregnant, and going through a reptilian mutation.
This might have worked better as a separate prequel. As it stands, all three parts almost feel more like companion novellas in one bind up.

Yes, it’s about Lewis’ transformation, but the character you should be paying attention to most is Wren and how all of these events and emotions throughout her life come together in a multi-generational story.

If you’re someone who loves metaphorical reads or being analytical, this is one to pick up — think along the lines of these widely accepted human-to-animal mutations as being in the likeness of Alzheimer's or any other degenerative disease or disability.

This is the best novel I've read in ages. When it comes out, I'll buy it and shelve it with The Portable Veblen, which is one of the few books I could reasonably compare it to, although they are nothing alike. Both satisfied my imagination in a way that seems rare and magical, elusive to try to describe, and entirely both surprising and inspiring. More like this please, publishers! I'm already looking forward to Emily Habeck's next book, whatever it might be, because I know I'll love it. Have already foisted this title on everyone I know and hopefully it's making its way to hundreds of TBR piles as we speak.

A charmingly and beautifully different love story of Lewis & Wren, and Wren & Angela, and Lewis & Wren after Lewis changes into a great white shark due to his condition... I know how it sounds, but this book tackled love, loss, grief, friendship, marriage in such an amazing way it's worth the read if you're looking for something new!

It's eloquent, poetic, lyrical, strange and a overall just a beautifully written book - it will not be for everyone as its writing style is extremely unique and though I myself was not really a fan of it, I can't deny it plays a factor in why this book is special. There are different POVs, some chapters are a sentence, some chapters are written as scenes from a play.

Both tragic and beautiful, Shark Heart A Love Story sits in magical realism that was written so well I questioned if I should see if there is truth to these transformations! It is sheer beauty and I've never read anything like it before. If you're looking for something different, I'd definitely say to grab this once it publishes.

Thank you to NetGalley

As a debut novelist, all I can discover about Emily Habeck is that she has a BFA in Theatre from SMU’s Meadows School of the Arts and Masters Degrees from Vanderbilt Divinity School and Vanderbilt’s Peabody College; and that background is perfectly represented in Shark Heart. Nominally a story about relationships and letting go, this novel asks big questions about finding meaning in life, and especially through art and service to others. Written in a variety of styles — some sections read like a dramatic script, some are in iambic pentameter; some are lyrical and touching, some funny and a few sentences long — and set in a world where it’s just accepted that a person could suddenly start to mutate into an animal (which serves as a metaphor for really any illness or strain in a relationship), there’s a real feeling of Habeck throwing every idea she has at this novel. And that’s a double-edged sword: I found this novel to be charming and moving in its unrestrained scattershotting, but I also felt like it could have benefitted from some restraint; I would have liked this even more if it had been longer and more focussed (for example, either give us more on secondary characters like Rachel and George or leave them out of it), but that’s not to say that I wasn’t charmed and moved. There is much to like in Shark Heart, and I am intrigued to discover what Habeck might come up with next; rounding up to four stars.