This One Sky Day is a wonderfully immersive read, you could easily float through these pages for days feeling perfectly happy and content.
I thoroughly enjoyed this five star read.

This book is AMAZING! Leone Ross - This One Sky Day. Everyone go and read it now! (Well, I'm actually not 100% sure that it really _is_ for everyone, but it's so, so good!) The following is a rave, not a review.
This was definitely something new. Very light somehow, even though it's rather somber at times, the whole book felt like it was floating a few centimeters above ground. And reading this book I think I understand just a little bit the feeling of being drunk from butterflies. It is a reading experience that transports you to a different plane. Not just the writing, the language is just incredible, sure and absolutely flawless. But it's also a completely different way of putting together words to create a world that somehow includes the reader.
The novel is set during the span of one day. It's also nearly 500 pages, so you not only get different characters that you follow through the day, but also basically all of their history. So you often don't know for sure if what is happening is happening in the present moment, in a memory or whatever other level of the narration. I loved this and found it very immersive and enjoyed getting caught in the stream-like narrative. But I can imagine, that other readers might find this a bit difficult.
The intense atmosphere, the immediacy of each moment,... everything about this glitters and shimmers with colors, sounds, smells and impressions. Every page opens before the reader like a kaleidoscopic box that leads you deeper into the novel and beyond its borders at the same time. It is superb!
It is truly sparkling and absolutely amazing in what it does. Such a world, magic and fantastic, but so very close to reality at the same time. It's like the world had gotten a second layer of hidden things, pretty and dark and sparkling. Want more adjectives? I can't recall to have read a book that is just so very vibrant, it is electric and vivid and every other adjective. It creates a world that completely envelops you.
What I think is, that this is an exceptional, unique and ultimately individual reading experience. The less you know about it, before you dive in, the better, I guess. Enjoy!
Thanks to netgalley and Faber and Faber for providing an ARC. I then went and ordered a hardcover copy as soon as it was out, because this one I want to have in my collection permanently to return to again and again.

A beautiful book written with skill and extraordinary imagination.

The island of Popisho is home to magical realism and is full of life. This is a love story that is set over the course of one day but spans many years. During this one sky day, ideas are explored, secrets are uncovered and futures are forged.

A fever dream of a book with a centre deeply rooted and reflective of reality.

The sun rises on another day in the archipelago of Popisho, a place where the strange and
fantastic are routine. Over the course of this single day, the lives of several of its residents
will intertwine, and by nightfall, all will have given a gift but many will no longer be the
same.

There's obviously a proper, academic definition for Magical Realism, but my personal one is this: "strange things happen that the author doesn't explain and that the characters don't question, therefore you shouldn't either." (Suffice to say, if you're someone who needs everything explained, this likely won't be your cup of tea (or rum; other beverages are available ;D). Everyone in Popisho has a magical gift (known as "corrs"), something that is uniquely their own: Xavier can flavour food through his hands; Anise is a healer; Romanza can tell when people are lying.
The story takes place over the course of a single day, and what starts out as the story of three characters - Xavier preparing a wedding feast, Anise investigating her husband's possible infidelity, and Romanza unearthing truth - soon grows to encompass much more: love, addiction, prejudice, politics, sex, violence against women (physical & sexual) etc. And if that sounds like too many ingredients, worry not - rather than spoiling the broth it all combines to make a rich, delicious stew. And if it also sounds like it could be dangerously worthy or pretentious, again don't worry - Ross is unafraid to be serious and sincere, yes, but she's also delightfully unafraid of humour and moments of outright bathos.
All conjured up with absolutely gorgeous, sensual, kaleidoscopic prose - seriously, the prose is good enough to eat, and not just the food descriptions (don't read this while hungry) - and a musical voice heavily influenced by Caribbean patios (Ross has admitted that she deliberately included a lot of references just for Caribbean readers, understandably (the title being one of them) but if you're not, don't worry, you can definitely still get the emotional resonacne of the story).
Characters who feel real despite the surreality and who will stay with you for a long time.

Thank you to Netgalley for the ARC in exchange for review.

I am not sure how to describe This One Sky Day by Leone Ross except to say that it is magical in every sense.

Set on an island (possibly in the Caribbean) populated with characters that each have a magical characteristic or ability, This One Sky Day is based on the events of a single day with the hero preparing a wedding feast for the president’s daughter while trying to find the spirit of his dead wife and connect with his one true love, meanwhile strange things happen to the women of the island and revolution is brewing.

Confused? Well don’t be, just sit back and marvel at the story telling, the magic, the beautiful characters and wonder how it will turn out. If you crossed the magical realism of Marquez or Allende with a touch of Shakespeare you might get to This One Sky Day.

Brilliant!

Popisho is an extraordinary novel, and one of the most singular stories I've read in a long time.

It's hard to know where to begin with Popisho because it is a novel that is so utterly brimming with life. And if it's a novel defined by its vitality, then its characters are its lifeblood. There is no shortage of complex, empathetic, and human characters here. There are younger characters and older ones, brothers and sisters, parents and children, lovers and exes. They all come with their own personal histories and narrative voices, and you get to watch them develop beautifully over the course of the novel. Part of why Ross's characters work so well, I think, is because this novel is so polyphonic. Ross is able to masterfully embody the voices of her characters, whether they are major or minor, and even if they are just mentioned in passing and never heard from again. Her voices have real verve, a kind of energy and buoyancy that I so rarely encounter in the novels I read.

One of the most remarkable things about Popisho is also how vivid< it is. Popisho as a setting is almost technicolour in its vividness. I distinctly remember reading one scene in this book and having to pause for a second because I was just so taken aback by how evocative the writing was, how palpable it made this world feel. Reading about the world of Popisho isn't reading about it so much as it is about being in

Frankly, I could go on and on about this novel: its humour, its empathy, its poignancy. It's just that good.

Wow! The amazing language* in this book gripped me from the start, and every page brought more questions than answers. Set in a not-quite-real corner of the Caribbean, with people in possession of their own individual magical powers, the story spanning a single day, had me enchanted. There were one or two sluightly clunky moments (avoiding spoilers here!) but the reasons for these were resolved with a little further reading and the book comes to a most satisfying and enjoyable conclusion.
Be prepared to set aside any expectations and just go with the flow!

*example - a bad mannered individual is described as having "no broughtupcy". Love it!!

Fabulous beautiful read, one that I couldn’t put down and one that I will recommend to everyone for 2021.

Unfortunately, I am going to have to call quits on this one at the 40% mark. I very rarely give up on a book partway through, but with more than 200 pages to go, it’s not doing anything for me. This particular breed of magical realism is usually something I really enjoy, but here the world building just had too much going on (kitchen sink-itis). The structure – alternating POVs, the action ostensibly taking place all on one day, but with extensive ‘back filling’ of character histories – slows the pace to a crawl, to the extent that I’m still waiting for things to get started (at 40% read).

I may pick this back up if I see any reviews that convince me it’s worth the time invested so far, but it’s going to one side for now.

I'm afraid I found this book meandering and weird (not in a good neil gaiman kind of weird). There is a scene with a mongoose entering a woman and one where all of the women's vulvas fall off that just...yuck. Not for me.

Really wonderful magic realism, at times not an easy read, you need concentration to follow the characters and what happens. Almost too complex to describe, we open with a chef preparing a feast, get a glimpse into his troubled life and the book flows from there. I really loved the lyrical way that Leone Ross sets the scene, this book is incredibly sensual, such a vibrant description that really brings the colours, sounds, smells of this small island to life.

With thanks to the publisher and netgalley for an ARC in exchange for an honest review.

The rich, evocative writing and high levels of magical realism in This One Sky Day, make for an intriguing and memorable story. The slightly bizarre story strand with the falling-out pum pums will certainly stay with me for a long time!

This is no reflection on this book, but it didn't work for me. I immediately struggled with the writing style, which I could clearly see was beautiful, and I continued to have difficulty with really knowing what the book was about.
I am obviously in the minority, and I am very glad to see so many readers have loved this book more. I feel sad that I am not one of them.

The dialogue is sharp, fluid, vibrant, and vibrates with the spirit of a culture and people that we are intimately linked to.

The prose is heady with meaning, reaches out to steep the reader in emotion, place, and space; the characters feel known and the smells of the world are rich.

The characters are central to the themes, setting, and world that Ross creates. They are our sisters, brothers, friends, and neighbours; all infused with a magic that is heavily influenced by our culture.

The diligence imparted in creating this story is palpable and every emotion is engaged while reading. It is impossible not to acknowledge the beauty found within these pages, the heart and empathy, the love, loss, and pain; how each serve their immense purpose of combining to culminate in true storytelling prowess.

Each page takes us from strength to strength and leaves us in awe of Ross' ability to weave a tale so unique yet marked indelibly with her heritage, her region, paying homage to the breadth of imagination that most assuredly is gifted from the ancestors.

Every once in a blue moon a book comes along with a story on its pages that drips pure concentrated sugar, sugar that is so sweet it hurts, so sumptuous and sensual, so bawdy and real, so mystical and magical. This One Sky Day is that book. A story of people that could fall from our mother's lips. There's no greater praise we could give a book.

DNF at 20%.

It pains me to give up on this but I am having a beyond hard time reading it. It took me days to reach 20%. I even paused it and returned to it, thinking it's my mood that prevents me from getting into it. But sadly after the break I've found it even more ridiculous and harder to read. I should have loved this novel because magical realism is something I truly enjoy and I also love reading stories of lands I am unfamiliar with. But for reasons that elude me, this books hasn't work its magic on me. Maybe I will try again in the future, but for now I am afraid I must give up on it.

Many thanks for the opportunity!

This One Sky Day is a truly impressive and unique achievement. Wonderfully inventive, filled with colour, humour, a veiled sadness and surreal imagery. The various elements (love, tale of addiction, postcolonial theme, political satire) mix and blend in really well. The world building is amazing, and so are the dialogues. It is a book to be savoured slowly, literary fiction at its best.

I am grateful to the publisher for an ARC via NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.

I tried to start this book multiple times but I failed to get past 10% each time. I found the magical world of Popisho intriguing but the writing style was very disjointed and difficult to follow so I couldn't engage with the story and I DNF.

Leone Ross has written a masterpiece; this is magical realism at its best, a truly original sensory feast of a novel.

Popisho is an archipelago hidden away from the rest of our world. It is Caribbean in feel and texture; the broken spoken word takes some getting used to, but is so worth the perseverance. The islands’ inhabitants possess magical powers, or ‘cors’; with each individual power, comes responsibility and the complexity of motivation and personal worth.

At its centre, this is a love story; but its multifaceted characters portray so much more. Over the course of one single day, we witness a community coming together to overcome corruption; it is a story of hope and a portrayal of the good amongst us, who will fight for what is right. Themes of addiction, love, family, sex, prejudice, sexism and inequality run through this beautiful tale – as the narrative becomes more surreal, our story comes to a climax and our characters are changed forever.

‘Not all of them hate us, just the loudest.’ Pilar would not take his hand away. ‘We are here, Zaza. We cannot die. But we may have to pass, for them to learn. “I’ve always trusted you, Pilar. Is you teach me. To waterwalk. Everything. To love. But no, not this!” Why not? Death is an idea. You watch things die every day and you rejoice.

This One Sky Day is a political, post-colonial satire; yet its writing is a poetic, sensual feast. It is a joy, a vibrant celebration of life; I read a review that said that Leone Ross had fun writing this, you can feel it. I agree totally; her writing is playful, witty and lyrical – her characters; beguiling, sensual and full of wonder.

Her imagery, is like nothing I have experienced; the alcoholic butterfly, the moth drug, the walking ghosts whose souls need to be laid to rest… luxurious food fills the pages and evoke such feeling that I spent a lot of my reading time hungry! I was totally immersed in the lives of the people of Popisho and the skill of Ross’s writing will stay with me.

‘But discussions inevitably devolved. He could hear the exact moment an argument frayed, when it became about feelings, still pretending to be facts’

‘It was all true and yet not, in that way that things were’

I could go on, but you should go read it.

This One Sky Day is one of the strangest books I've read in a while. The story is set across one day on the island Popisho. Characters have cors, magical abilities that they are born with such as being a healer, being able to detect lies and being super strong, and their stories are intertwined. I liked some parts of the story, even though they were really strange like plucking butterflies out if the sky to eat, but some parts were just a bit too odd for me. I found the story difficult to follow at times as it changes perspectives from different characters and it's not always clear. Overall I'm not quite sure what to make of this book but it is certainly quite different to anything else I've come across recently.

Leone Ross is incredible, I saw her on a panel at Bare Lit years ago and have followed her career ever since. Was definitely not disappointed by this novel! A true original, bursting at the seams with beauty, love and colour.