This was a good, short read. Very timely. I believe it is a must read especially with the social climate nowadays and the Me Too movement.

I don’t really understand how this was longlisted for the Women’s Prize for Fiction. There must be better written and more enjoyable novels out there.? From it’s abrupt writing style, miserable characters and triggering plot lines, this was not just an odd novel. It was downright unpleasant. Not for me.

Thank you to NetGalley and Penguin Random House Canada for providing a digital copy in return for an honest, unbiased review,

A well-written and engaging story of sisters, one developmentally/intellectually disabled, who marries their family handyman when their mom dies and she's left without family oversight. It brought up so many interesting questions about love and who gets to decide what and when it happens, and if the intellectually disabled should have the agency to make their own decisions even if they're being seemingly exploited. It's about sisterly love and duty, and how much your life must be the care taking of others even when you don't choose it. This brought up a lot for me as a mom of a young son with developmental disabilities and questions about how much should ever be expected of his older sister as they age. A compelling story with a mystery at its core. Really well done.

5 "jagged, twisted and oh so Canadian" stars !!

My thanks to Netgalley, Random House Canada and the author for an e-copy of this novel. I am providing an honest review. This was released September 2020.

This is a literary psychological thriller that would give Moshfeigh and Slimani a run for their money.

Two sets of dysfunctional sisters, multiple layers of disability, entitlement, narcissism and dark twisted psychologies bring this foursome to a head while linked to a drifter. Revenge is best served in Parisian haute couture, Persian parfum and oodles of money in grey Vancouver.

A novel full of mirrors, endless narcissistic suffering and the darkness of women.

The prose ranges from uneven ugliness to surrealistic poetic imagery and lots of pretentious prattle that you can gorge on while it churns the stomach, hardens the heart and keeps you away from accessing empathy for these most undeserving of maidens.

Read this and feel the creep ! A literary Canadian grotesquerie of the most earthbound kind !

Come on I dare you !

CONSENT is a story about family, love and duty.
The novel revolves around two pairs of sisters. The first pair are twins. Saskia a PhD student is the quiet and studious twin while Jenny an interior designer is impulsive and beautiful. A tragic accident lands Jenny in the hospital with critical injuries. Saskia immediately goes to be by her sister’s side putting her life on hold.
Sara and Mattie are the other two sisters. Sara is the oldest and has a successful career. Mattie is a gentle and loving person with special needs. Mattie’s care is overseen by her mother. Sara returns to the family home after the death of her mother. She discovers Mattie has married Robert the handyman who took care of the odd jobs around the house. Feeling Robert took advantage of the situation and Mattie, Sara had the marriage annulled and took over as Mattie’s caregiver.
The story of the two families weaves together in a most interesting way.
CONSENT is an excellent look at intricacies of family dynamics. Whether you are a sister or not the relationships in the story are compelling.
I loved this novel. I think it would make a good book club selection.
Definitely in my top 10 of the year.
Thank you to Penguin Random House Canada for allowing me access to an advanced digital copy.

This is the first book I have read by Annabel Lyon and I was not disappointed. Consent was longlisted for the Scotiabank Giller Prize this year so I was very happy to receive a
free digital ARC from NetGalley and Random House Canada for an honest review.

This is the story of two sets of sisters. Their lives become interconnected in surprising ways, -- a few times, in fact.

Jenny & Saskia are identical twins. Jenny likes the glamour, fashion and beauty of life and Saskia is all about her academics. After a horrible car accident, Jenny is in a coma and Saskia comes home to support her sister and parents.

Sara and Mattie's relationship is complicated. Sara, the older sister leaves home and pursues a career and a life of finer things. She likes beautiful clothing and fine wines. Mattie is loveable and curious and has a mental disability. When Sara and Mattie's mother dies, Sara finds out that Mattie has married the handyman, Robert. Sara cannot fathom her sister being married and takes it upon herself to care for her Mattie.

More tragedy takes place and both Saskia and Sara find themselves trying to cope and come to terms with how their lives are impacted because of their sisters. This story is about family relationships, sibling relationships, coping with grief, guilt and revenge.

I was not expecting the story to take the turn that it did which caused me to see the book in a different light. This would be a great book club read. There is a lot to discuss about the themes, the characters, the story and the title. I look forward to reading more of Annabel Lyons backlist.

Bookworm Rating: 🐛🐛🐛🐛

I enjoyed this intense story about two pairs of sisters, and how their lives intertwine. The writing is strong, and I can definitely see why it’s longlisted for the Giller Prize! Is it shortlist worthy? I’m pretty confident that it is, but I don’t know much about the other books yet to make a fair guess! Would I like to see this on the shortlist? YES!

In Consent, we definitely get a set of unlikeable characters, but understandable at the same time. I got where they were coming from, why they were doing the things they did. It was a good insight into dealing with death and the aftermath, feelings of guilt. The emotions were there, and it could definitely get intense at times! I think this book is one you will have to read a couple of times, because I’m convinced that there’s little clues sprinkled around that leads to the surprising (but soooo good) ending.

With that being said, the writing is good, and the storyline was too! But at the same time, it felt like nothing was happening, which I know sounds weird! It’s just there wasn’t much action, and when there was it was written in a way that kind of separates us from the situation. That’s just how I felt reading it. Like there were a couple of moments when I gasped and was shook, but other than that there wasn’t much emotional attachment to the events going on. I’m sure this is done on purpose to reflect our unlikeable main characters, but I’m not going to lie, it did feel a little jarring to me. Is this a bad thing? No, not really, but I think it’s important to mention!

Also, on a side note, can we take a minute to shoutout the amazing, beautiful cover!? Whoever designed this, great job! This book is definitely going to be added to my “Favourite Covers of 2020” list!

Keep this book on your radar, especially if you love literary fiction! This will make for some great discussions if you’re part of a book club, I can guarantee you that!

I am not surprised Consent has been nominated for a Giller Prize before even hitting its publication date. It was a unique reading experience, at points seeming a little dreamlike and at other points being incredibly real. It wasn’t what I expected at all, especially with the title of Consent, but it ended up being compelling and conflicting in how I felt about the content, which I believe was the point. It leaves me with a lot to think about.

Consent by Annabel Lyon is one of my favourite books so far year. True to its title, it explores the topic of consent from several angles: consent related to sharing our bodies, sharing our lives and sharing our innermost feelings.

The story centers around two sets of sisters: Sara and Mattie and twins Jenny and Saskia. Tragedy strikes both families separately while setting off a series of circumstances that soon bring their paths to crossing. The discovery of a common thread woven through their stories compels each to respond differently to their pain, grief and their futures.

Written in very realistic and sober tone, Lyon’s storytelling provides the reader an opportunity to feel every moment. At the same time, it challenges us to investigate our own beliefs about compassion, understanding and forgiveness as we reflect on the characters and the choices they make in the face of suffering.

Much of this story was set in areas in and around Vancouver, which, as a local, was extra fun for me. I was familiar with all the places where they went and there was even a description of the building where I live. The city was as well represented as the fragile and very human characters.

I adored this book and am looking forward to exploring more of Annabel Lyon’s work in the future.

Consent has been longlisted for the 2020 Giller Prize, for excellence in Canadian fiction.

Thank you to Netgalley and Penguin Random House Canada for the ARC.

Thank you to NetGalley for the ARC.
Being one of three sisters myself I am always drawn to stories about this particular family dynamic. How does my own relationship with my sisters compare? Just how dysfunctional are we on the scale? I’m happy to say not nearly as dysfunctional as the two pairs of sisters in Consent. The two seemingly separate stories eventually and inevitably do intersect as they explore the themes of powerful familial bonds and navigate tragedy. Characters are purposely flawed, selfish, guilt ridden. Lyon’s spare writing style is incredible, allowing your senses to take over through much of the prose, through the deliberate use of perfumes, wine, music, all of which enhance the storytelling without a lot of flowery language. Despite which it still had a distinctly gothic feel. Loved the ending!

What responsibility do you have for a sibling? What about if that sibling is vulnerable in some way?

This is the central question in Annabel Lyon’s Consent which follows the stories of two sets of sisters: Sara and Mattie, and Saskia and Jenny. The narrative alternates between the storylines, as seen through the eyes of Sara and Saskia respectively. In both cases, Sara and Saskia struggle with their relationships with their sisters, seeking ways to be independent until events conspire to make them wholly responsible for their siblings.

Lyon’s prose is highly enjoyable to read, filled with interesting language and a subtle wit. While initially the alternating storylines can be a little confusing, the reader only has to invest a little time and they soon become easy to distinguish.

The characters in Consent are part of what one calls “old money Vancouver” and they have the wealth to immerse themselves in a world of fashion, wine, perfumes, trips to Paris, and the study of French literature. Having read this on the heels of Michelle Good’s Five Little Indians which explores a very different part of Vancouver, Consent’s setting of wealth and white privilege was somewhat hard for me to reconcile.

Consent is an interesting, cerebral read. An intricate puzzlebox of a story, Lyon explores themes of obligation and identity and keeps readers thinking through to the end.

Thank you NetGalley and Penguin Random House Canada for this eARC in exchange for an honest review.

Note: This review will be posted to my blog (https://schatjesshelves.blogspot.com/) on September 24. It will also be posted to Goodreads and LibraryThing and linked on Facebook and Twitter.

I remember Annabel Lyon for her 2009 book The Golden Mean which I enjoyed very much. When I heard about another of her novels being published this fall, I requested an advance reading copy from the publisher.

This book focuses on two pairs of sisters. Sara and Matti are first introduced. Sara is an academic who has a love for fine wines, designer clothing, and expensive perfumes; she will spend a fortune on a dress. Her sister Matti is affectionate and trusting. Because Matti is developmentally challenged, Sara eventually becomes Matti’s caregiver.

The second pair is Saskia and Jenny. Though twins, they are total opposites in terms of personality. Saskia is the serious, responsible, hard-working university student while Jenny is the glamourous interior designer whose life is dominated by her self-centredness, impulsivity, and thrill-seeking. Because of an accident, Saskia has to make decisions for Jenny.

For almost three-quarters of the novel, chapters alternate between the two sets of sisters. In each tale, one sister, without consent, becomes responsible for the other. There are other superficial similarities like obsessions with clothing and perfume, but I wondered if the two narratives would ever actually intersect. Then tragedies bring them together in a shocking way.

The book examines how sisterly love can be entangled with resentment. Sara loves Matti but sees her as a burden who robs her “of the privacy Sara had sought so fiercely and protected for so long.” Sara admits to a friend, “’I wanted her at a distance’” and “The truth was that she was mean to Mattie, she was impatient, she was at times very, very cruel.” Likewise, Saskia loves Jenny but feels she can never escape her twin: “Jenny was her sun and moon: there was no escaping her. Saskia was ever alert to the ways her sister could hurt her, ever afraid of the ways Jenny might hurt herself.” Saskia thinks about the complicated truth of loving her sister: “Of course she and Jenny were closer to each other than anyone else. That closeness didn’t shield her from Jenny’s manipulations, her cruelty. Of course Saskia loved Jenny. That didn’t mean she wasn’t also frightened of her, and frightened for her . . . Jenny was the kind of person who could fly away or go up in flames at any moment. It was exhausting to be her counterweight, her rock, her extinguisher, her control.”

The novel also explores how grief can be entangled with guilt. Sara makes decisions for Matti without considering what might be best for her sister: “She had taken the sun and the moon from Matti.” A friend points out to Sara that she has not suffered because of having Matti in her life; he asks her sarcastically, “’Tell me all the opportunities you’ve had to turn down. Tell me all the jobs that were refused you. Tell me about your life of poverty and disenfranchisement and abuse. . . . You have money and education and power.’” Sara finds herself “chained in the masturbatorium of her own guilt, clawing at her own pinkest places.” Though she claims guilt will not consume her, Saskia says she is the one responsible for her sister’s fate: “’Me . . . I’m the one . . . I wanted her to know it was me. . . . Just like I want you to know it was me.’”

As the title indicates, consent is a theme. As a medical ethicist, Sara writes a paper, with Matti in mind, “on capacity and consent in adults with special needs” and Saskia, thinking about Jenny’s choices, writes a literary essay “on the implications of consent in Réage.” Neither Sara nor Saskia consents to the responsibilities thrust on them. Most significantly, the novel asks the reader to consider what s/he might consent to because of love.

I became impatient with parts of the book. Sara’s focus on perfumes and fashion and the purchase of a particular dress becomes tedious, as does Saskia’s later fixation with clothes. These sections have a purpose: “Clothes as costume and code.” It is noteworthy that Sara wastes an inheritance and what she spends on clothes “’could put a kid through college.’” Even Saskia asks, “’And I’m wearing my sister’s clothes, so whatever that says about me -.’” I just found that many of the descriptions were too detailed.

The novel’s best quality is its portrayal of relationships between sisters. I think anyone with a sister will acknowledge the realism of the complex sisterly relationships developed in this thought-provoking book.

Note: I received a digital galley from the publisher via NetGalley. The book will be released on September 29, 2020.

Consent is one of the most thought-provoking books I have read in quite some time. Its discussion of family relationships, responsibility and the repercussions of the choices made make this book quite unforgettable.

The story surrounds two sets of sisters. Sara is a medical ethicist who is three years older than her intellectually disabled sister, Mattie. Once Sara was able to leave home, she chooses to distance herself from her family, setting upon a journey of self discovery. Upon the death of the her last remaining parent, Sara is left with the responsibility of Mattie’s care. Before she has even sorted out her mother’s funeral, Mattie has married Robert, the handyman that her mother used to employ. Although Mattie appears to be happy, Sara has the marriage annulled and has Robert removed from the home.

Saskia and Jenny are twin sisters but far from living identical lives. Saskia is an academic, working on a Master’s degree. Jenny loves fashion and design, is impulsive and adventurous. When Jenny is involved in a life-altering motor vehicle accident, Saskia drops everything to be there for her twin.

Without giving anything away, these two families lives intersect in a surprising way. The book is beautifully written and poignant. There are intense narratives regarding mental illness which the author describes with both respect and clarity. The characters are well-developed and interesting and I found myself wanting to read more.

On a personal note, I loved that this book was set in my hometown of Vancouver. Having the knowledge of the neighbourhoods discussed, made the book more real to me. I’d recommend this book to book clubs and those that appreciate fiction about family relationships.

Thanks to Netgalley and Penguin Random House Canada for the ARC of this book in exchange for the honest review provided here.

So current in terms of consent issues. Compulsive reading, brilliant how the different threads come together.

Special thanks to NetGalley and the publisher for a free, electronic ARC of this novel received in exchange for an honest review.
Expected publication date: September 29, 2020
Saskia and Sara are two seemingly unrelated women; Saskia is a former university student, who has moved back home after her twin sister was in a tragic car accident, leaving her in a permanent vegetative state. Sara is a successful businesswoman, who is starting her life over again after the death of her parents, now taking over the primary caregiver role of her developmentally disabled sister, Maddie. Both women find common ground after their sisters’ pass away, bonding over their grief, and together, they seek revenge on the one man who they believe is at the root of their sisters’ troubles.
“Consent” by Annabel Lyon is a story about grief, loss, vulnerability, and the strong bond of sisters. Both Saskia and Sara go above and beyond to protect their sisters’ from harm, even after they have passed on.
I am new to Annabel Lyon, although she is highly regarded and award winning (and Canadian at that!). Her nods to Canadiana were appreciated, although she had far more French-language speakers in her characters’ world than I’ve ever even met (outside of Quebec anyway).
I found Lyon’s sentence structure to be difficult, with short, choppy sentences that added nothing to the story. Beyond that, Lyon’s writing style was pretentious (although her characters’ were also, so perhaps it was not Lyon’s writing itself that is at fault), and she seemed to skip over a lot of the interesting plot points, instead focusing on modern art, fashion and classical music (on these, she dwelled on for much longer than I would’ve liked, and not because I am uncultured or classless, but merely because they were not as relevant to the story as Lyon wants us to believe).
Maddie was a great character, and I appreciated the honesty with which Lyon depicted her. The relationship between the sisters was genuine, full of jealousy, honesty and dysfunction- there was definitely a lot of realism depicted here. I really got into the novel at the end, as Sara and Saskia came together and forged their plot. The ending itself was satisfying, and it brought a nice conclusion to the plotline.
Overall, this novel had an easy to read format, with lots of paragraph breaks. I enjoyed the characters of Jenny and Maddie, but Sara and Saskia took me longer to adjust to (although I did eventually). Lyon creates the bond of sisterhood in a hauntingly realistic way, and that kept me invested in the novel to the end.

Two pairs of sisters with seemingly nothing in common become entwined through mourning and guilt. Two sisters who appear incapable of looking after themselves, and two sisters who have the responsibility to reign in, watch over and protect the other.

Saskia and Jenny are twin sisters who the proverbial chalk and cheese idiom in real life. One is struggling with mental health issues, is exuberant, successful, erratic, and self-centred. The other is self-centred also but fulfils familial and societal expectations of completing the right opportunities in navigating academic goals for future success. Sara and Mattie are as apples to oranges also. One sister a pleasure-loving academic focused on fulfilling her own selfish desires for the finer things in life such as designer clothes, perfumes and food and wine at whatever cost, the other sister intellectually disabled, simple and trusting, having been kept from true independence all her life. Tragedies engulf either families, making one sister responsible for the other in situations that were unfair at times and inconceivable on the other. Death is visited upon each family leaving one sister from each pairing wracked with guilt, grief, and a desire for revenge.

This novel is a bare-boned account of selfishness being inflicted upon others and wrapping in up in self-pity and self-righteousness. It is sickening and repulsive the attitudes and excuses made to justify actions that were egocentric and often inflicted pain on another. It is repugnant how self-centred people are in society if this is a true representation of families today. Never is care for another person ever seen as a noble act: rather it is seen as an irksome burden to be endured. There is very real cruelty in the actions of one person towards another with far-reaching results. All but one of the characters are flawed but nothing redeeming is ever expressed, making them uncomfortable and grotesque. Innocent people are blamed, and revenge exacted in brutal methods that defy common decency. Self-destruction is imagined as noble and admirable. The selling line of “how love can become entangled with guilt, resentment and regret” is sugar coating a story of ruthless narcissistic behaviour that culminates in pathetic ends.

This is an uncomfortable read that highlights a lack of humanity, a devotion of self-absorption that is breathtaking in its ugliness. It is cold and unremarkable in its treatment of others. It highlights cruelty as something honourable. It is a sickening and repulsive view of families in a cold, clinical and cynical manner. It is not a fun and easy read. It will leave you pondering human behaviour and the consequences of such interactions. Painful and disturbing, it is a book that will leave you contemplating it for hours afterwards.

Consent in a sexual relationship is the way we're most likely to use the term today (and is the way that it is most obviously used in this book), but consent is explored in other ways, too: To what can you consent while intellectually delayed or under the influence of alcohol or drugs, and what responsibilities do you bear while so impaired? Why should family bonds force us to be responsible for others without our consent? Characters make presumptions (wrapping up purchases before the buyer has agreed to the sale), do things for another's “own good” (removing belongings that might be upsetting), manipulate, deceive, and take advantage; all without consent. All of this is churning behind the scenes, and in the foreground, a surprising (and surprisingly satisfying) narrative unspools to its inevitable conclusion. Unpredictable, smartly observed, and leaving me with so much to think about, what's not to like here?