Blurb:

A deliciously gritty and strikingly bold debut novel about discovering love where it has always been.

Elsie is a sexy, funny, and fiercely independent woman in South London. But, at just 28, she is also tired. Though she spends her days writing tender poetry in her journal, her nights are spent working long hours for minimum wage at a neighbourhood gay bar.

The difficulty of being estranged from her family, struggle of being continually rejected from jobs, and fear of never making money doing what she loves, is too great. But Elsie is determined to keep the faith, for a little longer at least. Things will surely turn around. They have to.

As she tries to breathe through the panic attacks, sleeping with her hot and spirited co-worker Bea isn’t exactly straightforward and offers Elsie just another place to hide.

As Elsie tries to reconnect with her best friend Juliet, her fragile world spirals out of control. Can Elsie steady herself and not fall through the cracks?

Review:

I came across this book through Sara and Cariad’s Weirdos Book Club podcast (which is a fantastic podcast if you’ve not already listened to it) and it’s not a book to which I would usually be drawn. However, I’m so pleased that I did. It is quite slow burning, but that didn’t matter to me, as the writing, especially the poetry, is just so exquisite and took me right into the lives of the characters and the themes in the novel. There are quite a few graphic sex scenes, which means it may not be for everyone, but if you can feel comfortable with this, it is so worth it.

The characters in Rosewater are wonderfully drawn, and even the relatively minor characters have extraordinary depth that means I was able to really understand how they were feeling and connect to them on an emotional level. The protagonist is Elsie, and we first meet her when she is confronted by bailiffs who have come to evict her from her home after failing to pay her rent. Although we have had very different life experiences, I still felt able to connect with her and was really rooting for her to get back on her feet.

The tagline for Rosewater asserts that the novel is “a story about love in all its forms” and this is what it is in a nutshell. The author explores all aspects of love from romantic love, to sexual love, to family love, friendship and toxic love and the emotional impact of each one. It gave me a lot to think about as I was reading and the depth of the author’s writing allowed me to be engaged the whole way through.

The ending is an ending I didn’t expect, but it works really well for the story. I will be thinking about these characters for a long time to come.

Rosewater is available from Amazon.