Thank you NetGalley and Catapult for providing me with an ARC in exchange for my honest review.

Wow. This is a heavy, bleak novel with beautiful writing. The plot/premise did not work for me as it never actually went anywhere and the hits just kept coming for the protagonist.

However as much as the story did not work for me, I want to give huge props to the author for the writing style. It is descriptive and strong and fierce. I can feel the heat of the character on fire emanating from the pages. However the story is about a character who is a hot mess in a hot mess of a world— I felt it needed some balance to the despair. I look forward to reading more from this author.

The narrative in this book is similar to a meditation. It's fluid, water-like At times, it seems as one is in a dream, yet at other times, the reality becomes painfully clear. The story is of a girl in university and her struggle to make sense of her world and her place in it. I wish the plot moved more swiftly at times, but overall it was a pleasant read.

This book was a slow burn for me, it took a while to get going but when it did, I was hooked! I'll definitely be looking for more from this author.

I’m judging a 2021 fiction contest. It’d be generous to call what I’m doing upon my first cursory glance—reading. I also don’t take this task lightly. As a fellow writer and lover of words and books, I took this position—in hopes of being a good literary citizen. My heart aches for all the writers who have a debut at this time. What I can share now is the thing that held my attention and got this book from the perspective pile into the read further pile.

“The open wilderness of adulthood stretched ahead like so much wasteland.”

"The Inland Sea" by Madeleine Watts is the story of a young woman who is in crisis, against the backdrop of a planet that is also in crisis due to climate change. Though the writing was exquisite, there really wasn't much of a plot and I had a difficult time figuring out the point of it all. I really wanted to love this book because of the top-notch writing, but much of the story felt random and disconnected to me. I think others will absolutely love this book, but because I prefer more of a plot, it just wasn't for me.

The life of an unnamed narrator - a young woman living in Sydney and working at an emergency services call center- unspools even as climate change driven disasters plague Australia in this intense novel. She's a mess. She drinks, has sexual encounters indiscriminately with some consequences, and muses about life. She's related to John Oxley, a early explorer who sought an inland sea on the continent. This is for fans of the recently popular genre of young women with issues who do not have names. I know Watts is trying to make a variety of points and that I'm going to be the odd one out but I just found this a bit much (there is one graphic bit I just. well, you'll know it when you read it). Thanks to Netgalley for the ARC. Not my cup of tea but might be yours.

There was so much depth to this first novel. You know when you find a writer whose style you just click with? That definitely happened for me with Madeleine. It took a while for me to get used to the style in which she jumped around but when I did, I couldn't put the book down. She writes such raw observations and such a relatable character in a transitional period of her life. This all peppered with the changing climate and effect on our psyche and our life made for an impressive and important debut book.

Unsettling. The main character was not relatable to me at first, but as the story progressed that changed. The lines blurred between reality and fiction as well as history and future. To be honest I wasn't expecting so much depth to this book. I guess it snuck up on me.

Keep thinking about Oxley and his theories as well as the suggestion that he was both too late and too early. Aren't we all?

Absolutely brilliant novel. The cadence and flow reminds me a bit of Anna Burns’ Milkman. This novel uses the story of an aimless, stressed, depressed and reckless twenty something woman to speak about climate change and our responsibility to the planet.

This is a scorching account of what it is like to be young, uncertain of one's self, and moored in the climate crisis. The narrator seeks meaning and the ability to communicate through writing, but depression and a sense of nihilism send her into unfulfilling relationships, casual sex, and a steadily declining sense that life is worth living. And she's not entirely wrong: when the country is on fire and no one seems to care, what do you do?

Illuminating novel about the anxiety brought about by the dangers of climate change in Australia.

As nearly everyone around the world in early 2020, I watched the news about the Australian bushfires with absolute horror and heartbreak. So when I first saw this book, I knew I had to read it. The Inland Sea is a timeless multigenerational climate-driven tale which explores two seemingly unrelated storylines: of a colonial explorer, John Oxley, who strove to find an inland sea in Australia, and a contemporary coming-of-age of his great-great-great-great granddaughter set in Sydney.

Climate change is at the heart of this novel and is portrayed in a subtle and unusual way. John Oxley would not have imagined the future of the place he searched, in the land that would become so damaged. His great-great-great-great granddaughter, who is unnamed in the story, works as an emergency dispatcher asking whether the caller needs an ambulance of an emergency fire intervention - all the while enduring wilfires in her own personal life, partially caused by her job, which is giving her so much anxiety.

My favorite thing about this book is not the symbolism, though, but the main heroine's part of the story. She struggles with so many contemporary problems, as well as abuse and binge drinking, with the vast natural destruction on to of that. There is an underlying feeling of anxiety and danger directly linked to climate change which the main character has no control over.

*Thank you to the Publisher for a free advance copy of this book in exchange for an honest review.

I really enjoyed getting to know the main character and her struggles, it was a great journey to go on. It was really well done.