I loved the moral story behind this! This is a moving tale that expertly crafting the dreamy plot. Loved it!

*Thanks to NetGalley and the publisher for an advanced reader copy in exchange for an honest review.*

It's giving The Giver.

Scott Alexander Howard's The Other Valley is a melancholic examination of the decisions we make, the knowledge we gain, and the unintended consequences waiting for us in an unknowable future. While these all sound like grand, heavy, essay-spanning ideas, Howard never sacrifices the intimately written life of his central character for the sake of philosophical speculative fiction.

Odile Ozanne is a quiet teenage girl resigned to living life on the margins until she is put forward as a candidate on her town's council. This council, however, doesn't deal with trifling matters like approving new street signs or settling zoning disputes–instead, they resolve issues that affect the town's present, future and even the past.

Howard's novel is a patient character study wrapped in a sci-fi concept that could've spun off in a raucous Back to the Future caper if he had let it. Instead, The Other Valley takes its time getting to the care issue that will plague Odile for decades. The core concept of similar valleys existing alongside each other at separate points in time is the sort of fantastical leap you can't examine for too long, or else it might fall apart in its storytelling logic. Instead, details of the other valleys are drip-fed throughout the novel, giving just enough to stretch the realm of plausibility when needed.

Lois Lowery's The Giver, a perennial favourite in elementary schools across North America, was my closest touchpoint in characters and vibe-wise for The Other Valley. Everyone in the story, from the people around Odile to Odile herself, is just slightly off from what you would expect from a normal person. They are unnerving simulacrums of humanity that still elicit empathy whenever something goes awry, but I found them a step removed from a character you would often find in contemporary fiction. Somehow, this made her life fascinating to follow because you could never tell where slight variations from our modern lives would crop up. Odile is sympathetic, but she's rarely fleshed out enough to feel pitiable. She feels removed from the world around her, and you can understand why she follows a path toward the Conseil even if I found her desire to pass judgment on visiting the other valleys completely unrelatable. Like The Giver, this isn't quite an earthly town, but it isn't so far removed to feel truly alien. For the first section of the novel, I tried nailing down an era, but I eventually understood that Howard created a fittingly timeless world– unmoored from a decade or era we'd find recognizable.

Speaking of sections, The Other Valley opens up as the story progresses, expanding beyond the scope of one teenage girl on the brink of her potential career. The opening act was easily the most compelling section for me, as the central town develops and Odile works her way through the Conseil apprenticeship program. I appreciated Howard's ambition in the following parts, which ultimately served the underlying message and conclusion, but it made the overall story feel a bit uneven. The later sections–if you want to split it into the traditional three acts– are outsized by the opening and get diminished by comparison. Still, it is better for the novel to surge through its ideas and questions in one finely crafted story rather than dragging it out across a trilogy.

The road through The Other Valley is not necessarily always a happy one, but the riveting story of a young woman dealing with her past, present and future is as compelling as it is unnerving.

DNF - I enjoyed about 20% of this book. The premise was strong & the author has a firm grasp of the world they are building & working within. However, much of the story felt like filler - naming names, sitting in situations - & I don't feel that added to the story itself. Understandably, the MC appears rather young, perhaps even younger given her naivety. However, the progression of the story into a teen drama wherein the very same & predictable turns come around was not something I had an interest in reading. I wanted more from & for Odile. I might check up on this book once it is published but, as it stands, I am stepping out of the race. I very much loved the inclusion of French; it felt authentic & smooth. The actual philosophy in the book & the author's own background in the field of study was what drew me into this story. Ultimately, the pure naivety of the characters prevented me from feeling as though the depth of the topic was explored in a way that I was eager to find - this is neither here nor there; I am glad to see the subject explored for various age ranges & readers, generally. This just was not a book for me, ever so much as I wish that it was.

If you were a fan of the television show Dark, you'll be mesmerized by this speculative fiction novel, in which a nameless town exists between two identical valleys that are distorted echoes of the same town and its inhabitants 20 years into the past and future. Travel between the towns is prohibited except for those how have experienced a loss, and when a teenage girl glimpses a future version of her friends parents the course of her life is disrupted.

The prose was beautiful and the plot darkly mesmerizing, but I would have liked it more if it didn't move so slowly. The novel could have been edited down to half its size and had a comparable impact: it becomes difficult to slog through slower sections, especially in the absence of a particularly propulsive plot. This was my other main concern: the author drops so many red herrings that it becomes challenging to determine what course the story is going to take. Is it a thriller? A murder mystery? A spy novel? Things begin to make sense around the 60% mark, but I nearly lost steam several times before that point.. I'd recommend this more for fans of dense, small-town interpersonal dramas than science fiction, with the latter being a footnote to the development the characters and their relationships.

This is a quiet gem of a novel. Scott Alexander Howard takes a unique premise and executes it beautifully – never relying too heavily on his fantastical plot device to convey young Odile’s heartfelt story.

I loved the exploration of the moral and practical reasons a citizen should and should not be allowed to visit their neighboring valley to the east (20 years into their future) and to the west (20 years into their past). A more scrupulous reader might uncover some time travel plot holes here that I tried not to think too hard about – but if you suspend your disbelief and take the story at face value, you’ll find a thought-provoking and wistful tale that I, for one, greatly enjoyed.

What a ride! This started out with Never Let Me Go vibes, and also reminded me of The Giver. I thought this would be an interesting but low key read but it turned into a thriller! This world was such a fascinating concept and was so well imagined. I could not put this down. Very satisfying read.

Thanks to NetGalley and the publisher for the opportunity to read this ARC.

Odile lives in a town of secrets. To the west, it’s twenty years behind. The towns repeat in an endless sequence across the wilderness. At 16, the children of the town begin to apprentice and Odile is hoping to be on the Conseil where she can make decisions on who can visit the other towns - parents, widowers, children, wanting to tour the past to see their loved ones once more.

When Odile recognizes a tour, she has to keep the sighting to herself. Can she? Will she? She may impact all of life as it goes forward if she does not. A story more about grief than action, this is a moving, dreamy, tale.
#atria #TheotherValley #ScottAlexanderHoward