What a Shame
'Intelligent, moving and darkly comic' The Sunday Times
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3.8 • 79 Ratings
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- £4.99
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- £4.99
Publisher Description
THE WORD-OF-MOUTH PHENOMENON THAT EVERYONE HAS BEEN TALKING ABOUT:
'Intelligent, moving and darkly comic . . . taking us deftly from serious explorations of trauma to riotously funny scenes of modern life' The Sunday Times
'Haunting and hilarious' Daily Mail
'A brilliant debut' Cariad Lloyd
'Full of heart, wit and feeling' Caroline O'Donoghue
'I loved it!' Lauren Bravo
'Heartfelt, sharp-but-tender' Erin Kelly
'I couldn't stop reading' Angela Scanlon
'A glorious new talent has arrived' Emma Gannon
'Raw and utterly brilliant' Otegha Uwagba
'Absorbing and clever . . . I fell in love with Mathilda' Cathy Rentzenbrink
'Will be read for years by any and all young women looking for a friend' Scarlett Curtis
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There is something wrong with Mathilda.
She's still reeling from the blow of a gut-punch break up and grieving the death of a loved one.
But that's not it.
She's cried all her tears, mastered her crow pose and thrown out every last reminder of him.
But that's not helping.
Concerned that she isn't moving on, Mathilda's friends push her towards a series of increasingly unorthodox remedies.
Until the seams of herself begin to come undone.
Tender, unflinching and blisteringly funny, What a Shame glitters with rage and heartbreak, perfect for fans of Emma Jane Unsworth, Dolly Alderton and Holly Bourne.
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'Ever-so-relatable' Cosmopolitan
'Delightfully frank' The Skinny
'A modern story of grief and loss' Refinery29
'Dazzling . . . By turns funny, sharp, raw and overwhelming' Heat
'Fizzes with energy, rage and love' Jessica Moor
'A book that beautifully balances the light and the dark' Chloe Ashby
'Dark, nuanced and provocative' Laura Jane Williams
'An extraordinary novel that will stay with me for a long time' Laura Kay
APPLE BOOKS REVIEW
“What is your pain? From where does it come?” asks Abigail Bergstrom’s debut novel, What a Shame. It’s a question Bergstrom’s lead protagonist, Mathilda Manning, gets to the bottom of over the course of this astonishing book as she grapples with the double grief of losing her father—an alcoholic who was a patchy dad—and her boyfriend, who she thought was The One before he abruptly walked out of her life. But she—and her brilliant band of fellow London-living millennial female friends—sense there is more to her pain than those two life-altering events, forcing her to confront its real root. The methods here aren’t exactly typical (there is a “banishing bath”, tarot readings, reiki and hallucinogenics), but it all fits into Bergstrom’s hyper-contemporary narrative, which is pin-sharp on everything from wellness to interiors trends, awful marketing campaigns and the capital’s blackboard-adorned cafés and wine bars. At first, this zany, zeitgeisty read might feel like another in a long line of novels about thirtysomethings living in London as they navigate life’s ups and downs. But what emerges is a raw, unexpected look at grief, shame, trauma and pain, the growth to be found if you dare to confront them, and a moving tribute to the power of female friendship. It will make you laugh out loud and move you to tears.
