3.5 stars. A good read, with so much interesting twists and turns. Very interesting portray of rural living and poverty, however a rather dissatisfying end. Cannot really decide why I didn't love this book, other than I felt sad it wasn't more of an journey for the characters.

OK, after reading this book, I had to disappear into the world of bubbly, happy rom-coms because this was dark as hell. It's beautifully written, and I always love books where the characters aren't under 30 because so many books are that way (the twins are 51), but it's just a lot of unhappiness. While that's not necessarily bad, and there is a glimpse of hope here and there, it's not a super uplifting book. But not all books have to be, and we need to read those once in a while, I think.

Julius and Jeanie have a simple life outside of the grasp of modernity and refuse to conform. They depend on each other to protect the world they understand and keep the rest at bay. When their small world falls apart, (more than once) we begin to see just how strong these two are. This is a book about what makes a family a family. It’s about loyalty versus security. It’s about secrets and perceptions, modernity versus subsistence living. Fuller packs so much into this beautiful novel that you will want to read it more than once.

In UNSETTLED GROUND, Claire Fuller once again delivers a resonant, richly characterized novel, haunting in its claustrophobic intensity. Faced with their mother's death and its consequences, these siblings make some difficult, unsettling (sic) choices: the result is a novel which delivers in its promise to keep the reader pondering it, long after the final sentence.

I very much enjoyed this story. It was wonderfully written. I look forward to the author’s next book!

I love Fuller's writing and this book of loss, grief and family secrets was moving and heart-wrenching. The end left me unsatisfied though. While I did enjoy this book overall, it wasn't my favorite of Fuller's books. Thank you to NetGalley and Tin House Books for the ARC.

I am sorry for the inconvenience but I don’t have the time to read this anymore and have lost interest in the concept. I believe that it would benefit your book more if I did not skim your book and write a rushed review. Again, I am sorry for the inconvenience.

Jeanie and Julius are 51 years old and have always lived with their mother, Dot, in poverty in a ramshackle cottage. Julius works odd jobs to provide food for the family but Jeanie has spent her life at home. At a young age, her mother told her that she had heart problems. She frequently stayed home from school and never finished her education. She spent her life in her garden and playing music with her family. When Dot dies unexpectedly, Jeanie and Julius are not sure what to do next. They know that they can't afford a funeral and after leaving the body in the parlor for several days, they decide to bury her in the yard. Soon the owner of the cottage takes the cottage back and makes them move out. Now they have to make some real decisions -- Julius wants to continue to be loyal to his sister but he is also yearning to be independent from his family Jeanie struggles to find work and a home for them to live in. When they begin to find secrets that their mom kept from them - they begin to wonder who they are and if everything she told them was a lie. Will they be able to recover and learn to live life without their mother?

This character driven book moved rather slowly at times but it was well worth it to read and see how if Jeanie and Julius could become adults instead of the children that they've always been treated as, and find their places in the world.

stark and haunting, this is an interesting novel that keeps you guessing. It doesn't fully come together for me, but it was an enjoyable read.

I love Claire Fuller. I read BITTER ORANGE earlier this year and loved it—a seminal Gothic novel, big decaying home and twist ending in all. I was so excited for UNSETTLED GROUND, about a pair of 50-something twins in a kind of arrested development, whose mother has just died, that I saved it for my Christmas break as a treat. As always, Fuller's writing is so spot-on: I could practically feel the scenes she builds. But honestly, that immersive quality was too much! I love a sad book, but UNSETTLED GROUND was too depressing and unsettling for me. It had many great pay-offs in the last 30 pages, and I am glad I finished it, but it definitely had an emotional toll on me.

Thank you to Tin House and NetGalley for the ARC.

This book is about Jeanie and Julius, 51 year-old twins who live in a rural cottage far away from civilisation that comes from extreme poverty. After their mother passes away, they are left trying to pick up the broken pieces and also trying to manage everything since they did not deal with money related things in the past.

It is not a happy book, so if you’re looking for something to cheer you up, this is not it. But if you want a book with excellent writing that explores human emotions and characters in depth, this is the right choice.

It was fascinating to read the character growth of the twins, whose hardships keep increasing as the book progresses because they’re so lost without their mother. More and more of their mother’s secrets start coming out, which coupled with extreme poverty does not help the twins’ situation. The writing is melancholic, which has to match the story, but there are a few situations that suddenly bring hope to the mix. I liked how the author dealt with the emotions of the twins, especially Jeanie.

It's been a long time since I've picked up a book that drawn me in from the first page and held my attention from beginning to end. In, Unsettled Ground, Claire Fuller takes us into the lives of fifty one year old twins Jeanie and Julius Seeder. When their mother Dot unexpectedly collapses and dies of a stroke they could not have envisaged how their lives would change and how many secrets her passing would reveal.

Definitely recommending this book to my colleagues.

Written in straightforward and clear ways, this powerful book takes us along a nightmare of a family disintegrating in their old age after the death of the mother. The family was made up of adult twins, in their 50s and their 80-year-old mother who kept a loving but manipulative hold on her children as they made do for themselves in a dilapidated home on an estate. Their home was gifted to them for free for all the years of their lives, from the landowner, according to their mother and common knowledge in the small town they inhabited.

In the very beginning, Dot suffers a stroke and dies, leaving the twins to deal with a life she had kept at bay, As they deal with the realities of what faces them, they come to terms with what they are and are not capable of doing, what was fiction and what was true, and the truth of how fragile their existence is finally coming to light. Their skills are few and not very profitable. But from those moments where they are playing music together, so naturally, we see some light.

I really liked the frank look at poverty, community, and interdependence in this book. There are not many "good" or likable characters here, and the author didn't create any easy outs to lessen the suffering of the twins. I found it to be a good story told well, and understand why it was included in the Women's Prize 2021 Short List.

Thanks to the publisher for a digital arc in exchange for an honest review.

Unsettled Ground is one of those books that I can't figure out why I waited so long to read it. You'll laugh, you'll cry, you'll be creeped out a bit. An excellent Claire Fuller is definitely one I will watch and continue adding to my shelves!

I had a strange brain moment when requesting this book, and mixed up Claire Fuller with another author I've read (and not loved) in the past. I was pleasantly surprised how fabulous this was.... and then realized my mistake! I would expect nothing less from Ms. Fuller, as I have adored all of her books.

Excellent story! I really enjoyed the writing and wasn't far in when I decided to see if the author had more books because I was in love. This story is dark and hopeless but also not. Things are not peachy here, so if you're looking for sunshine, this is not the read for you. If you like to get dirty in the grim realities of life and claw your way along with the characters in the hope of victory, this will definitely get you there.

Fuller writes such beautiful stories and Unsettled Ground is no exception. We have a couple of storylines happening here and even though it doesn't quite feel like a mystery, there is a lot of stuff happening that you don't know what's going to happen next. Fuller is quickly becoming one of my favorites to read, and I always look forward to her next book.

4/5 Stars

This was such an odd and compelling story. The beginning immediately sucked me in. I enjoyed the oddly unsettling tone throughout. I really enjoy Claire Fuller's writing style. However, the middle portion of the story somewhat lost me, but then the end picked up again and I enjoyed the reveals and how the story wrapped up.

Claire Fuller is truly a gifted writer - this novel was bleak and delved into the lives of 51-year-old twins left on their own for the first time, and yet her writing left you turning every page to see what happens next. Ultimately, it was too depressing for me to be a great read, but I will always pick up a Claire Fuller novel!

Unsettled Ground by Claire Fuller is an incredibly sad, incredibly tender, atmospheric beauty of a book. It follows 51 year old twins Jeanie and Julius who are bombarded by family secrets and the reality of everyday living after their mother dies. This book definitely acts as a deep character study, particularly for Jeanie, but it isn’t without plot and proper tension either. I felt so anxious and sad when I first started reading this, but I also could not put it down, more and more so as the book went on.

The character development is strong here, not only in Jeanie and Julius, but in all of the side characters as well. Fuller can really write in such a stunning and sympathetically human way. The writing is so atmospheric without ever being distracting, and the interactions of these strange people in these bizarre scenarios still felt so humdrum, so relatable. I slid into this reality so easily in a way I wasn’t expecting. The anxiety I felt initially later turned into an odd form of comfort. I felt so much for the twins, their small worlds, and their particular vulnerabilities. I just found this story to be such a strong reminder of lives lived outside what we consider commonplace, normal life. There was so much value still in these characters who live on the fringe of our expectations or our reality even.

Another thing I really loved in this book is that it managed to address big issues such as illiteracy, poverty, asexuality, et cetera without ever feeling like it was trying to Tackle a Big Issue. These things were just a part of the story, a part of these people. There weren’t any answers to be found necessarily or philosophies to ponder. Life sometimes looks different, bad things happen, and it is what it is. That was such a bleak but also comforting notion that was so persistent throughout this while reading.

I’ve fallen head over heels for Claire Fuller and cannot wait to read more from her. This was probably one of the best reads for me so far this year. I know I’ve used this word once already in my review, but it was so so tender. I can’t find a way to describe it better. Absolutely recommend to anyone who can handle a heavier read and craves attention to detail, brave character construction, and a fierce literary quality in their books.