I listened to the audiobook of Remarkably Bright Creatures by Shelby Van Pelt for book club. I would describe it as a soft book - it is heartwarming and kept my interest. I think a lot of people would like it for this reason. I especially liked the chapters from the perspective of the octopus. Still, I could not overlook the parts of it that I didn't care for. 

 

A couple of things I can share that aren’t spoilers: Cameron's character was an actual jerk and the way he talked about women gave me the ick. The dialogue did not ring true. There were characters that for me, had no purpose in being a part of the story. Also this story was set in a fictional town north of Seattle and I feel like surfing isn’t a big thing up there? I lived in eastern WA for four years and I’ve never heard of anyone in that area surfing - it’s not really wild ocean with surf-able waves. I think there are areas in Washington where surfing is more of a thing, but not where this book was supposedly set. So the fact that a character owned a surf shop and went surfing every morning had me skeptical (among many other things). 

I didn't like the way everything wrapped up so neatly. You can't tell me that two people who are related that way would actually possibly meet like that IRL. I am willing to suspend my disbelief for the octopus parts, but couldn't suspend it for Cameron happening to get to know Tovah by taking over her job, and then discovering they are related. Also the part where he conveniently leaves his phone on the car so nobody is able to get ahold of him... so many things were so contrived and I just didn't care for it.

 

I think this book would appeal to a lot of people (actually I know it does bc I rated it the lowest by far at book club lol), but it wasn't for me. I think this book is comparable to Lessons in Chemistry because of the grief themes and how some chapters are narrated by animals, but I preferred Lessons in Chemistry.