Such a Fun Age (Unabridged)
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- $14.99
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- $14.99
Publisher Description
AN INSTANT NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER
A REESE'S BOOK CLUB x HELLO SUNSHINE BOOK PICK
"The most provocative page-turner of the year." --Entertainment Weekly
"A great way to kick off 2020." --Washington Post
"I urge you to read Such a Fun Age." --NPR
A striking and surprising debut novel from an exhilarating new voice, Such a Fun Age is a page-turning and big-hearted story about race and privilege, set around a young black babysitter, her well-intentioned employer, and a surprising connection that threatens to undo them both.
Alix Chamberlain is a woman who gets what she wants and has made a living, with her confidence-driven brand, showing other women how to do the same. So she is shocked when her babysitter, Emira Tucker, is confronted while watching the Chamberlains' toddler one night, walking the aisles of their local high-end supermarket. The store's security guard, seeing a young black woman out late with a white child, accuses Emira of kidnapping two-year-old Briar. A small crowd gathers, a bystander films everything, and Emira is furious and humiliated. Alix resolves to make things right.
But Emira herself is aimless, broke, and wary of Alix's desire to help. At twenty-five, she is about to lose her health insurance and has no idea what to do with her life. When the video of Emira unearths someone from Alix's past, both women find themselves on a crash course that will upend everything they think they know about themselves, and each other.
With empathy and piercing social commentary, Such a Fun Age explores the stickiness of transactional relationships, what it means to make someone "family," and the complicated reality of being a grown up. It is a searing debut for our times.
APPLE BOOKS REVIEW
Kiley Reid’s scathing but easy-to-read debut opens with an all-too-common episode of racism. The aftermath of that explosively viral encounter goes on to scar all of the people involved: Alix and Peter, a bourgeois couple desperate to prove their coolness and post-racial progressivism, and Emira, a young woman who is struggling to figure out the differences between true connections and transactional relationships. Narrator Nicole Lewis’ thoughtful performance emphasizes both the arch humor and deep wisdom in Reid’s satirical story, deftly mocking social-media posturing while her high-energy pacing makes tense encounters crackle. Ultimately, it’s Reid’s deep compassion for all of her characters that gives Such a Fun Age its charge—and its power.
Customer Reviews
Love love love
I need this into a movie.
Enjoyed and thought provoking
A book about micro aggressions
So disappointing
The author took a strong black female lead character and marginalized her and her story … so disappointing