Many thanks to my friends at @bookclubfavorites @scribnerbooks and @simon.audio

 

Wildly imaginative.  Bizarre.  Poignant. 

 

How Broder managed to pack such a punch in a short 240 pages, I don’t know.  It’s true talent for sure.  

 

In trying to escape the emotional weight of a sickly husband and dying father, our unnamed protagonist flees to the California desert where she finds a nonnative cactus and a fight for survival.  

Utterly bizarre but completely captivating.  Broder penned a hallucinatory journey through emotion that felt both unmoored and relevant.  This seemed personal, as though a journey of catharsis for the author.  It’s rare to find a storyline that exposes the rawness of grief as this one does.  

 

But this isn’t a bleak story.  Dark humor abounds.  Talking rocks, the love of the Best Western, apologies to bunnies…. these are just a few of the absurdities that kept me entertained.  

 

🎧 I’m not generally a fan of author’s narrating their own works (outside of memoirs).  But Broder proved me wrong with this one.  Her narration added a quirkiness and depth to the story that kept me engaged throughout the whole experience.