Sarah O'Connor

Book Review: We Love You, Bunny by Mona Awad

NotSarahConnorWrites

October 14, 2025

I received this book from Simon and Schuster Canada in exchange for an honest review.

“The Collective can be a powerful force. Perhaps together you’ll make the word flesh. Tap the Wound and bring it to vivid life. Making something beautiful is, after all, the best revenge,” (Awad).

Samantha Heather Mackey has just published her debut novel. Living every debut writers dream, she’s been attending literary events and has now finished off her book tour in New England where her university frenemies, the Bunnies, are unhappy with how they’ve been portrayed. Kidnapping Sam, the Bunnies decide it’s their turn to tell their side of the story. While holding the ax, each Bunny takes a turn recounting what brought them together and what they were able to create together while a bound and gagged Sam is forced to listen and learn about the Collective of creation. Continue reading

Book Review: Ley Lines by Tim Welsh

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August 23, 2025

I received this book from River Street Writing in exchange for an honest review.

“The land would always return to its feral character; the trick is to place your bets on when and how. But the bust is inevitable. As sure as the sun fades with the silvering of the day,” (Welsh 84).

As the Klondike Gold Rush comes to an end, unsuccessful prospector Steve Ladle takes a job from a con artist to go to the top of a mountain where he finds a giant, seemingly alive, human ear. The Ear follows Ladle back to Sawdust City to the great enjoyment of the town where tourism starts to thrive again, not knowing that these events will bring about the towns end. Continue reading

Book Review: Atmosphere by Taylor Jenkins Reid

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July 27, 2025

“Well, we are the stars…And the stars are us. Every atom in our bodies was once out there. Was once a part of them. To look at the night sky is to look at parts of who you once were, who you may one day be,” (Reid 90).

Joan Goodwin lives a quiet life. She loves her niece Frances and is content with working as a professor of physics and astronomy, though she’s always wished to be amongst the stars she studies. When she learns that NASA is seeking women scientists to join the Space Shuttle program in the summer of 1980 and is selected as one of the candidates, Joan trains and befriends the other astronauts and finds a place for herself in the world she never thought she could have. But then on a mission in the Fall of 1984 everything changes. Continue reading

Theatre Review: Visiting My Mother and Other Repetition Compulsions

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July 24, 2025

A son attends his biweekly therapy session, a family dinner is held, and a daughter visits her dying mother. Though these three scenarios seem unrelated, each bleeds into one another, exploring the cyclical nature of trauma in AfterLife Theatre’s newest show Visiting My Mother and Other Repetition Compulsions. Continue reading

Book Review: Never Been Better by Leanne Toshiko Simpson

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July 15, 2025

“My friends and I have tried cutting out sugar and just plain cutting, magnet stimulation, talking to empty chairs, herbal remedies, pulling out our hair on the bathroom floor, every therapy in the alphabet, and we still feel like we don’t deserve to live…We’re all just trying to make the best decisions we can, trying to drown out the loudest internal scream you could imagine. The craziest thing I’ve heard is when people tell us we’re not trying hard enough,” (Simpson 225).

A year after being discharged from the psych ward, Dee learns that her best friends Matt and Misa are getting married in Turks and Caicos. Matt, Misa, and Dee met at the psych ward and bond over their shared time there and their mental health struggles, but no one else at the wedding knows where Matt and Misa met. This makes Dee uncomfortable, as well as the fact that she’s been in love with Matt since meeting him when they were both in the hospital. With her sister Tilley in tow, Dee has a plan to attend the wedding and prove to Matt that the wedding is a mistake and that he should be with her instead. Maybe then Dee will finally feel that she’s caught up to everyone around her. Continue reading

Book Review: Return to Sender by Vera Brosgal

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July 10, 2025

“When something amazing happens, it’s natural to want to tell somebody, if only to confirm that you’re not losing your mind…And this mystery was definitely stressful…First he needed to conduct some experiments,” (Brosgol 60).

When Oliver’s Great-Aunt Barb whom he never met dies and leaves her apartment to his mom, it feels like a fresh start. After a year of couch-surfing in various relatives homes, Oliver is about to start attending the elite Whittle Academy where students come to school in helicopters and have the latest gadgets. But Oliver is attending because his mom has just gotten a job as a custodian there. Oliver wishes his life could be as easy as his classmates at Whittle, and one day after slipping a wish into a mysterious mail slot in his new apartment it comes true. Oliver wishes for more and more things and life appears great for him, but a wish can only be granted at the detriment to others. But is this enough to stop Oliver from asking for more wishes? Continue reading

Book Review: A Song for Wildcats by Caitlin Galway

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July 8, 2025

I received this book from River Street Writing in exchange for an honest review.

Caitlin Galway’s A Song for Wildcats follows characters from postwar Australia, late 1960s France, the Troubles in Ireland, 1930s New York, and 1980s Nevada who are processing grief, trauma, love, and their place in the world after facing adversity. She’s a talent of a writer, seamlessly moving through time and setting and transporting readers into these characters lives with ease. There is a connected theme of queer relationships, trauma, and a slow understanding of the protagonists to come to terms with what is happening around them. It’s a beautiful and strong collection of stories, one I looked forward to returning to. I can’t wait to read more of Galway’s work!

Read my full thoughts on each story in the collection below: Continue reading

Book Review: All This Can Be True by Jen Michalski

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July 4, 2025

I received this book from The Next Best Book Club in exchange for an honest review.

“The thing about grief was that you never got used to it. It was survivable, physically, but it still hurt the same each time, like surgery without anesthesia or diving into cold water,” (Michalski 29).

Long unhappy with her life and marriage, Lacie Johnson is about to ask her husband Derek for a divorce when he suffers a stroke and falls into a coma. Her plans at starting over now halted, Lacie wonders what her life will be now that she doesn’t know what Derek’s fate will be as her two grown children return home amongst the chaos. But in that chaos Lacie meets Quinn, a kind, former riot-grrrl on her way to British Columbia to live with a group of grief survivors after the death of her young daughter. Lacie and Quinn have an instant connection, but Quinn has a secret connection to Derek, but she doesn’t know how to tell Lacie without destroying everything. Continue reading

Book Review: She’s A Lamb! by Meredith Hambrock

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July 1, 2025

“You have to stomp it all down. You have to bury it. You have to bury all the messy parts and let your bright parts shine,” (Hambrock 83).

Jessamyn St. Germain is a star, or she knows that soon she’s going to be one soon. One day she won’t just be an actor who occasionally books laundry commercials, she’ll be able to quit her job as an usher and be performing in musicals on Broadway. She knows she’s close when the theatre she works at holds auditions for it’s Christmas show, The Sound of Music, because the role of Maria is hers. Except that Jessamyn doesn’t get cast in the show, instead she’s assigned the job of childminder and must look after the kids playing the Von Trapps. But Jessamyn knows that watching the child actors is a test, that she needs to prove to the director how good she is at Maria and swoop into the role when the lead proves she can’t handle it. And it will happen, it has to. Stardom is so close to Jessamyn and she’ll do anything to finally stand in the spotlight. Continue reading

Book Review: Fuse by Hollay Ghadery

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June 29, 2025

I received this book from River Street Writing in exchange for an honest review.

“Labels are the armour that keeps us safe; they also keep us too heavy to move. They may have their uses for some, but it’s good to strip them off now and then so you can see what you’re dealing with. There’s an atomic lightness that comes with seeing people and things for what they really are at their root,” (Ghadery 107).

Ghadery’s memoir explores her struggles with disordered eating, mental health, while understanding her identity as a biracial woman. Continue reading