Chrysalis

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Then, she looks into meditation and enduring long periods of stillness that luckily she trained her body for and with meditation it was time to fully train her mind. The novel charts her physical and mental change into a new person who eschews many societal norms and finds meaning in making meditation and fitness videos online, attracting a huge following. Susie’s hinterland is also only glimpsed, and through the book we uncover much about why the protagonist becomes an influencer, but little sense of how. The second perspective is told by her mother who gives backstory on our unnamed main characters childhood through to adult life where she eradicates all family ties. It’s like they don’t even notice the thing is too small, like they’re just giant people holding regular-sized stuff.

For Susie this woman is a possible role model, someone to emulate as much as she is someone to nurture. It was hard to be in the present, she said, but if her body were heavier and more in control, then her thoughts would clear and her mind would recover its power. This provocative, fiercely imaginative debut follows a woman trying to slip the shackles of society by controlling her body and mind in extreme ways , by one of Granta 's Best of Young British Novelists. Her health guru rises from the ashes of an abusive relationship, but also discards those who’ve outgrown their use.

His hair was thick and, when he stood beneath the air conditioning unit, it moved in graceful waves. In the foreground was a large and veiny calathea plant, while the garden behind her provided a satisfying textural backdrop – a lilac spray of Russian sage, a japonicus bush with leaves like coins.

In this novel we follow a young nameless woman and her transformation, as through the eyes of the three people closest to her: her mother, her best friend and a lover.They all watch as she strengthens her body and mind and begins to post viral videos that advocate for her viewers to take drastic measures to acquire true self-sufficiency. I enjoyed the story, and read it as an entertaining and interesting fictional narrative of triumph over adversity (individual shortcomings, bullying, abuse) through an act of self-invention, as well as a persuasive allegory about aspects of our society .