At less than four weeks away from giving birth, Annie is shopping for a crib at IKEA when a massive earthquake hits Portland, Oregon. Determined to make it to her husband at his job, Annie starts walking. Though she does have some interactions along the way, Annie mainly spends the time contemplating her life.

The book takes place over the course of one day, though there are plenty of flashbacks to the previous months to give the plot some movement. That being said, the book is barely readable. There is no excuse for poor grammar and sentence fragments, as well as starting sentences with so, but, or and. The best part of the book is when the author describes Annie's anxiety over the impending motherhood without her mother there to guide her. I am a fan of survival fiction, but I do not like this book.

Tilt had a good premise and the author clearly did her research, but it missed the mark. Overall, I would not recommend this novel to other readers.

Disclaimer: I was given an Advanced Reader's Copy by NetGalley and the publisher. The decision to read and review this book was entirely my own.

A pregnant woman is shopping for a crib in Ikea when a catastrophic earthquake hits Portland. Injured, she manages to escape the store, but then must cope with a city in turmoil. Buildings and bridges have collapsed. People are dead or injured. Having lost her cell phone and car keys, Annie, who should have been home in bed on the first day of her maternity leave, has no other options. If she wants to find her husband or her home, she must walk through broken streets, scrounge food and water, and avoid the dangers of human predators and aftershocks.
Over the course of a single day, Annie remembers her own past, the loss of her beloved mother to Covid, her husband's failure to achieve his dream of acting success, and her own choices to back away from happiness - dropping out of college and taking a dull job to pay the bills, dealing with her first unexpected pregnancy as she approaches middle age, and giving up her own dreams of writing because life got in the way. In a running monologue to the unborn child she calls "Bean," Annie explores the meaning of her life.
Tilt is an adventure in survival, an exploration of the lives of women, and a love story. I didn't always like Annie, but I became invested in her story.. I was fascinated by the variety of people she met - kind, selfish, heroic, and monstrous - as the horrors of the earthquake pushed them all to their limits. At the end, I found myself wanting more!
I would like to thank NetGalley and Simon and Schuster for the opportunity to read a free copy of Tilt in exchange for my honest opinion.

Tilt by Emma Pattee is just a WOW of a great story, fast paced and completely fresh premise. This will make a great book for book club discussion!

Full review link posted soon.

WOW WOW WOW-I loved this book so goddamned much, and not to be dramatic, but I’m mourning the fact that I’ve finished it and that there’s not another 200 pages to read, because I have so many questions that need answered and I want to keep following Annie and Bean and see what happens next. I hope there will be a sequel some day-there aren��t many books that I’ve read that deal with life after a massive earthquake has struck (just sayin-if the author is reading this)

I’m a HUGE fan of dystopian books and disaster movies, and I love even more when the story builds up the characters and really allows you to get to know them. Not only do I know Annie, I AM Annie, or at least a big part of her, and I know many other millennials that will also agree. Her and Dom’s struggles with bills and dreams and jobs and just life was a truly honest depiction that I haven’t read about in a long time. Equally honest is Annie’s thoughts and fears regarding her impending motherhood and just motherhood and children in general.

Portland is a favorite city of mine to visit, and it’s one I’ve always dreamed of living in. Even if you’ve never been there, the author describes the city and its neighborhoods in a richly detailed way that you can almost imagine taking a break from the book, liking Il and seeing the city through Annie’s eyes. And if you ever doubt how much Annie walked during the story, just google map the route and you’ll see how determined our protagonist was.

Another favorite part of disaster movies/books I love is the actual disaster part. The author says in her afterword how she consulted with scientists and disaster planners, and her research shows. For those of you unfamiliar with the city of Portland, its buildings aren’t made for earthquakes, so an earthquake of substantial size, like in the book, would be devastating for the city. There are depictions of death and destruction in the book, but nothing overly graphic for readers that are looking for a trigger warning

This slim post-apocalyptic novel was completely gripping and so well-written. We follow Annie, who is eight months pregnant and shopping for a crib in Ikea, on a harrowing journey after a huge earthquake hits in Portland, Oregon.

Anxious to get home to her husband, she starts off walking amidst the rubble, ruminating the whole while on her marriage and pregnancy, talking to her daughter in utero, Bean, as she makes her treacherous way through the streets among a population that is reeling, past destroyed homes and buildings.

I was right there with her, smoke rising from the ruins, panicked and wounded people all around. What a realistic, possible scenario in the Pacific Northwest! So well-written. I loved it, at the same time that it unsettled me with its veracity about likely human behavior, which, in my opinion,can be as scary as the aftershocks of a big quake.

Others mentioned in their reviews that they did not like the ending because of its lack of closure, but I thought it was perfect, and hopeful, even though we don't know more about how things will end.

Many thanks to NetGalley, the publisher and the author for granting me access ahead of publication to an eARC of this striking debut. I recommend it highly - it is expected to be published on March 4, 2025.

Annie is at the end of her pregnancy and at IKEA to buy a crib when a massive earthquake hide.

This one keeps the readers interest from the very first page and never lets up. It takes place during an emergency, so there’s a sense of doom and anxiety throughout. There are some very tense moments that made me want to skip through the chapters that take place in the past but they are important too. This would have easily been a five star read for me except I did not like the ambiguous end. There were a few plot lines left open and while I know it was done purposely, it’s not my favorite.

“People have done harder things than this. People have been through worse than this. Nobody I know, but still, people.”

Tilt comes out 3/25.

5 ⭐️. I LOVE me an end-of-world tale. This climate apocalypse story had me hooked from the beginning. Our VERY pregnant main character expressed so many of the inner anxieties I hold about parenting, humanity, and surviving in a world that is built to destroy us. FIVE STARS.

TY to Simon Element & Marysue Rucci Books for the advance reading copy in exchange for an honest review.

Tilt
The premise of this book had my heart pounding. I needed to know what happened to the main character. This was a quick read, but getting invested in anything other than knowing the outcome was difficult.

Wow, this book is amazing! It's essentially a harrowing and beautifully written survival story. The main character is a pregnant woman who realizes painful truths about her partner during the course of 24-hours, since experiencing an epic natural disaster while shopping for a crib at IKEA. I have not been able to stop thinking of the narrator, the people she encounters, and consider how I might respond in the same situations. Highly recommended if you enjoy books about survivors, natural disasters, marriages, pregnancy, friendship, and/or coping with life and death circumstances. I will read whatever Emma Pattee writes next. Thanks to NetGalley and publisher for the ARC. Pub Date: March 31, 2025.

#Tilt

Thank you, #Partner @marysueruccibooks, @simonandschuster, and @netgalley for my #gifted (free) copy. Pub date 3/4/25.

This was such an addictive read, but also scary, because natural disasters can happen at any time. For how short this book was it sure packed in a lot and I couldn't put it down. The ending........ well, it wasn't my favorite, but it wouldn't stop me from recommending this book.

Annie is nine months pregnant, and it's her first day of maternity leave. Her husband Dom leaves for work, and Annie decides to go to IKEA to buy a crib. Annie is grabbing the crib out of the bins when everything starts to shake, a huge earthquake. When Annie finally makes it out of IKEA she sees how bad the earthquake destroyed everything. With her purse lost in the rubbish, no cell phone towers working, she has no other choice but to walk to Dom's work. The long walk is a struggle, but she has a lot of time to think about her life, past and present.

I keep thinking about this book. Having lived on California in the late eighties/early nineties, I vividly remember the shake and roll of major earthquakes. I had not thought much about a strong earthquake occurring in Portland, but Emma Pattee sure did. The story is about a very pregnant woman shopping at IKEA when an earthquake hits and her struggles home to find her husband. Along the way, with transportation and power down, we learn about her not so great marriage and learn about other people she meets along the foot journey around Portland. This story is even better if you know Portland and can follow the route in the story. Overall, I much enjoyed this book and will likely never forget it. The writing and storyline kept me from putting this book down.
Thank you NetGalley for an ARC.

BOOK REPORT
Received a complimentary copy of Tilt, by Emma Pattee, from Simon Element | S&S/ Marysue Rucci Books/NetGalley, for which I am appreciative, in exchange for a fair and honest review. Scroll past the BOOK REPORT section for a cut-and-paste of the DESCRIPTION of it from them if you want to read my thoughts on the book in the context of that summary.

If this book is of interest to you, I highly, highly recommend that you read it in one sitting, so as to get the full fever dream effect.

I say that because I think I would’ve enjoyed it more that way, vs starting it yesterday and finishing today—probably because when I returned to it I found that I had a great deal less empathy for most of the characters. Now that I think about it, that, in turn, is probably because the age difference between me and them was so pronounced.

Plus, I was more hopeful about things during the first half of the book than toward the end. Also, the ending proper was such a letdown. I guess I’m a stereotypical North American who requires more closure?

I guess.

PS
It dawned on me at some point while reading this book that I have yet to read anything positive set in Oregon. Or, if I have, I’ve forgotten it completely. Seriously. That state tourism board would probably give just about anything for somebody to publish some non-bleak fiction set there.

DESCRIPTION
Set over the course of one day, a heart-racing debut about a woman facing the unimaginable, determined to find safety.

Last night, you and I were safe. Last night, in another universe, your father and I stood fighting in the kitchen.

Annie is nine months pregnant and shopping for a crib at IKEA when a massive earthquake hits Portland, Oregon. With no way to reach her husband, no phone or money, and a city left in chaos, there’s nothing to do but walk.

Making her way across the wreckage of Portland, Annie experiences human desperation and kindness: strangers offering help, a riot at a grocery store, and an unlikely friendship with a young mother. As she walks, Annie reflects on her struggling marriage, her disappointing career, and her anxiety about having a baby. If she can just make it home, she’s determined to change her life.

A propulsive debut, Tilt is a primal scream of a novel about the disappointments and desires we all carry, and what each of us will do for the people we love.

"Tilt" follows a pregnant woman through a single harrowing day in Oregon. Annie is shopping for a crib at IKEA when a massive earthquake strikes Portland and (quite literally) shakes up her whole world. As Annie struggles to survive and to find her husband, a struggling actor with whom she has been fighting, the reader gets an inside look at her life via vivid flashbacks. We see her own mother struggling to support her, Annie's abandonment of her dream to become a playwright, her ambivalence about marriage and parenthood, her frustrations with her husband and more. Annie is not a terribly likeable protagonist. She's immature, at times downright mean, and her innermost thoughts are not the ones you wish or hope to see in the mind of a pregnant woman. But I found her interesting and she makes a compelling companion for the journey through a disaster-stricken city as well. I'd consider this a 3.5-star debut novel from author Emma Pattee that I'm bumping up to 4 stars for the scientific and geographic detail.

The premise of a catastrophic earthquake had me eager to pick up TILT. A very pregnant woman finds herself in Ikea, of all places, when her world is literally shaken to the core. We follow the woman in the aftermath of the quake as she sets out to find her husband. While I was expecting a compulsively readable story, it was much quieter and contemplative than I anticipated. The writing felt very stream of consciousness and just like the woman navigating her new surroundings, a bit lost and directionless. I was reading the novel on my kindle and the ending felt very abrupt to me. Readers who appreciate stories with closure may find the ending to be a bit lacking.

Overall, I think this story had great promise but I’m left wondering what the author wanted me to take away from this story.

RATING: 3/5
PUB DATE: March 25, 2025

Many thanks to NetGalley and Simon Element for an ARC in exchange for an honest review

A timeless tale of fate with and survival. We take a journey with a pregnant woman who is desperate to find her husband after an earthquake. This book gave me ALL the feels. I was right next to Annie as she faced every obstacle possible. I felt hopeless and hopeful simultaneously. I was on the edge of my seat. This book was vivid, atmospheric and written beautifully.

Annie, pregnant and already feeling as if life is piling down on her, finds herself crib shopping in IKEA when an earthquake strikes. The book follows one day in the aftermath of this natural disaster, and Annie trying to make her way home.

There are parts of the story where Annie reminisces about her past, and how she got to this point in her life. Some of those parts were a bit slow for me. However, the chapters dealing with the aftermath of the earthquake were riveting!

I look forward to more books from this author and appreciate the opportunity to read!

Annie, 9 months pregnant, is standing in the Portland, Oregon IKEA looking at cribs when the earthquake hits. The one we’ve dreaded and expected for years.

What follows is her daylong journey to crawl out of and over the rubble and find her way home, while mentally navigating the crumbled past of dreams she has left behind due to the path her life has taken.

This is an intense, emotional character study with visceral descriptions of pregnancy and natural disaster. Annie was a very realistic character who is easy to root for despite her human flaws.

The writing flowed effortlessly, pacing kept me turning pages, and I will admit that this curmudgeon had a tear in her eye at the end. I doubt I will ever forget this story; it has inspired me to re-think my own life choices and dreams … and that kind of novel is a rarity.

I couldn’t put this book down. The writing made me feel that I was experiencing everything that the main character was experiencing. I stopped numerous times throughout just to admire the authors descriptions and writing. The ending left me deeply unsatisfied however. I wanted to know what happened to Taylor and Dom. I don’t want to imagine what horrible things happened to them! Sometimes a book left with unanswered questions is ok- but in this case it just left me disappointed. .

Tilt follows one woman’s journey in the aftermath of a major earthquake. As someone who grew up hearing stories about and seeing photos of the big earthquake in California in 1989, the events in this novel seemed very realistic and relatable. It is clear that the author has done her research on the topic!

Tilt is a very emotional and intense read. Definitely worth reading for the introspective dive into humankind, relationships, trauma response, and natural disasters.

I received an ARC of this book from NetGalley.

Tilt is the story of very pregnant Annie, who experiences a massive earthquake while shopping for a crib in a Portland, Oegon IKEA. As Annie tries to make her way back to safety and her husband, Dom, she chats with her unborn baby, and we learn about Annie and Dom's marriage, their careers, and Annie's fears about her life. This is such a sweet story about survival and issues that must be overcome when one has the desire to survive.

This book is well written and compelling! I read it in record time - I couldn't wait to find out how the story would end. I was quite frustrated with some of Annie's encounters, blessed by some, and ultimately satisfied with the ending. I can see Tilt becoming a movie.

Thanks to NetGalley for allowing me to read and review Tilt.