Wow! What a fun ride this was!

I’m not always crazy about a millennial whose life is a mess, but Allison, the star of the show, pulled me right into her mess and I couldn’t put the book down. The story has pizazz—it’s witty and edgy, funny yet horrific, and it moves fast. And Allison is just so damn likable, you’re rooting for her from page 1.

Allison has just bought a house, which is a huge deal, and in just a week, a hurricane, like the big bad wolf, blows her house down. She’s shocked, trying to figure out what to do, when suddenly she gets herself into big trouble. Yeah, she makes a bad choice—and lol, I’m already thinking how I won’t be able to sell this book to a friend, because she just hates reading about women who make stupid choices. I know my friend would want to shake Allison; knock some sense into her. Hell, I wanted to shake her. “Hey, knock it off! That’s a really bad idea!” But in Allison’s defense, a lot of single 30-somethings would do the same thing and just not be unlucky like she was. The dumb things Allison decides to do after her first bad decision aren’t her fault. They’re bad, though, and it made me super nervous. But suddenly the cat’s got my tongue; you’re not going to get another word out of me about what’s going on. And don’t, I repeat, don’t, read the blurb, which is spoiler city. (Very annoyed that the marketers did that. Argh!)

All I’ll say is that early on, there’s a harrowing car trip as Allison drives from North Carolina to New Jersey, heading for her mom’s. I was glued to her side, sitting in the passenger seat, worried and attached more than I thought I’d be because, damn, the book had just begun. It’s tricky how Dermansky did that—Allison was my best friend all the sudden, and I wanted to help her. Ha, but Allison had no intention of listening to me or anyone else.

This book is part light and funny and part dark and scary, with a twist of the absurd thrown in. There’s a kind mom who makes endless turkey sandwiches for Allison, and an attentive neurosurgeon who offers Allison his swimming pool, which gives her some peace. (Swimming is her natural Xanax, I think.) The book lets you see a realistic and complex reaction to trauma, and although I’m making that sound all abstract and medical, it’s not. It’s vivid as hell and gets under your skin. And I’ll throw out a teaser: you’ll see Allison touch her head a lot, and sometimes utter a dramatic, catchy phrase at the same time (like both her fingers and her mouth have mantras). It’s an image that’s stuck in my mind. Another cool thing is that you’ll never figure out where the story is going. There’s suspense, because Allison, who most of the time is upfront, suddenly isn’t telling us what her plan is, and we want to know—now! My one complaint is that I sort of wanted an epilogue. I say "sort of" because the ending is so powerful, an epilogue might be a comedown and detract from the zap.

Marcy Dermansky, you’ve found yourself another fan. I want to—no, have to—read everything you’ve written. Our famous Roxane Gay as well as our popular Kevin Wilson (who wrote Nothing to See Here, one of my favorite books) both loved this novel, so I’m pretending I’m hanging out with them and we’re all raving about your gem of a book together. Oh, and by the way, even though I don’t love the zillion “girls” that you see in titles, I do love the name you gave this book.

Thanks to NetGalley for an advance copy.

This was…..different, and so good!! A quirky, quick, engaging story. The writing was really different but it definitely worked for this. You experience the mind of Allison, the main character, through all her thoughts, which helped me feel more connected.

Allison leaves Hollywood after breaking up with her boyfriend. She scrapes up some money and buts herself a small beach cottage. Soon after she moves there's a hurricane that wipes out her home. After this, she faces many traumas along with a brain injury. This was a little crazy...... but I found it super interesting and entertaining. Definitely not a light-hearted read though! Haha.

Thank you to the publisher and netgalley for the gifted copy. All opinions are my own.

This book had me thinking that there would be a late reveal that the whole thing was a dream. That did not happen. But that feeling is there.

Overall pretty good, but I think I would have liked this more if it was structured a bit differently. Everything was written very pragmatically and matter-of-fact, and it could feel sterile at times. Part of me feels like that could have been the author's intent, but as a reader, it was just a little hard to hang on to. This is a read that should have taken me just a few hours, but ended up taking me a few days.

Allison Brody left CA. to settle in N.C. A Cat 3 hurricane blows her house and her life to bits..
Allison is charming, lovable and more than a bit off-center!
She does manage to resolve her problems and it makes for a great read

I liked 𝐇𝐔𝐑𝐑𝐈𝐂𝐀𝐍𝐄 𝐆𝐈𝐑𝐋 by Marcy Demansky 𝘚𝘖 𝘔𝘜𝘊𝘏, but dang, it’s a hard book to talk about! I’ll start with the reason for the title. Allison, 32 and a budding screenwriter, buys a North Carolina beach house she’s never seen in person. She’s fleeing Hollywood after a bad relationship and finds she adores her little beach house. After being there less than two weeks a hurricane hits, completely destroying Allison’s home. Thus, "Hurricane Girl". ⁣⁣⁣
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Don’t worry, I’ve given nothing away. That all happens in the first handful of pages. The rest of the story is about the many personal hurricanes swirling in Allison’s life. There’s a rather shocking twist early in the book that makes Allison’s journey toward finding herself anew even more complex. That’s it. I can give you no more about the story. (I advise going in as blind as possible.) However, I can tell you that the writing is exactly what I’ve come to expect from Dermansky. Excellent! This story is creative, unique, horrifying, weird, funny, and pretty much unputdownable. At a slim 240 pages, I finished it in a single day. I'm not sure 𝘏𝘶𝘳𝘳𝘪𝘤𝘢𝘯𝘦 𝘎𝘪𝘳𝘭 will be right for everyone, but if you like quirk, if you like bizarre you 𝘯𝘦𝘦𝘥 to read it. Marcy Dermansky is now firmly cemented on my list of auto-buy authors. ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️💫⁣⁣⁣
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Thanks to @aaknopf for a beautiful #gifted copy of #HurricaneGirl.

"This book was a ride - I COULD NOT put it down. Where was it going? What was happening? Was it all going to fall apart or resolve itself?

I'm struggling to write a review without giving away too much for anyone who may read this, BUT I will say that this was unputdownable - I kept reaching for it to race to see what would happen (made possible by the short, punchy chapters).

Stylistically, I loved how Dermansky wrote - ultimately, the ending wasn't incredibly surprising (I kept thinking there was going to be a weird circular narrative where the protagonists' ex boyfriend was actually her current boyfriend), but, I still enjoyed it!

This is what I'd call an exciting, ""soft thriller"" and I think it's an incredible summer read, especially if you're looking to break up some longer, heavier reads."

This book was SO WEIRD. Not in a bad way - just very quirky. I'm not honestly sure the point necessarily or what I was supposed to get out of this, it was a little too out there for me, but it was a quick, entertaining read.

I was sent a physical copy of this book I will be reviewing that version on my Booksta along with publishing that review to retail sites. Thank you so much again for the NetGalley approval I loved this book.

Traumatic brain injury. Ashley Judd. College hookup turned brain surgeon. A hurricane.

Thirty-two year old Allison is having a rough time. Fleeing LA and her movie producer boyfriend Allison has just scraped enough money together to buy herself the perfect little fixer-up beach bungalow on the shore of North Carolina just in time for it to be literally swept away by a hurricane. Allison's story continues to spiral and we end up spending the majority of the story inside her head and she recovers from a traumatic brain injury.

Hurricane Girl is kind of a weird little book. The narrative is fuzzy and disorienting because we're seeing events unfold from Allison's perspective. This makes for a very immersive story. It also makes Allison somewhat of an unreliable narrator. The publisher promised a story on the "knife's edge of comedy and horror" and Hurricane Girl manages to balance that narrow space as Allison finds her agency. A page turner with a satisfying ending.

If you’re looking for a quick read that tightropes between comedy and horror, you need to pre-order Marcy Dermansky’s newest novel, Hurricane Girl.

The novel follows Allison Brody, a 30-something woman who escapes an abusive relationship, drives across the country to live in a quiet beachfront house. And all is well until… a hurricane destroys Allison’s ramshackle home and her dream life. Uprooted, Allison checks into a motel, goes to a bar, meets a nice man goes home with him, and said man hits her over the head with a glass vase.

By the way, this is only the first 20 pages of Hurricane Girl. Allison then almost immediately drives from North Carolina back to her hometown in New Jersey (?!?!). We follow Allison as she recovers from this traumatic incident, as she oscillates between anger and resignation, between revenge and escapism.

My only complaint about Hurricane Girl was that it ended a tad abruptly for me. The ending, however, does not negate the experience of reading Hurricane Girl and seeing how Dermansky strikes a delicate balance between comedy and horror and what is & isn’t reality.

If you’re a fan of Dermansky’s previous book Very Nice (a decadent yet literary read)—Hurricane Girl will also be right up your alley, although it is definitely darker than Very Nice (thought just as funny).

Hurricane Girl comes out on June 14th. Pre-order Dermansky’s fifth novel from your favorite bookstore.

I have read all of Dermansky's books and really loved them all, Bad Marie most of all! I was excited to get my hands on this one. True to form, it's quirky, jarringly told, bizarre, and quick. I can recommend it to anyone who likes Miranda July, Odessa Moshfegh, Alyssa Nuttig, the book Pisces.

However...this didn't really do it for me. It was sort of a miss so I don't think I was the right reader for it. The bizarre idiosyncrasy of it made me keep the turning the pages to see how this crazy story would culminate, and what would become of Alison, the m.c. Unfortunately, I sort of felt like I didn't get much of a return on my time investment here. The denouement was lacking, or maybe my imagination was not a match for this book!

I think if you like Dermansky it's definitely worth the read. Because of the strange and compelling writing style and plot, I will for sure recommend it to fans of strange fiction. I have 100% certainty that there are great readers for this book, as evidenced by all the wonderful reviews here. Thank you!

3.75 stars

Readers looking for a fascinating expression of a character's processing of her own compiled traumas will enjoy the deep dive (terrible and yet still intended pun) here.

Allison, the m.c., has had a rough go of it, and things get way worse before they start to get...processed. As she reflects on her recent professional success in Hollywood, Allison also reveals that she has recently experienced some challenging personal circumstances, and in her attempt to escape those, she finds herself in a newly purchased beach house in basically an opposite location. Less than two weeks after her purchase of this little slice of pulling a geographic heaven, a hurricane that seems out to destroy Allison personally extends its wrath in her direction. In the immediate aftermath of these traumas, Allison gets literally and figuratively scarred by one of the *most* bizarre events, and this becomes the impetus for Allison's forced processing of all of this compounded trauma.

The actual events/plot of this novel are so straightforward, but they reflect the ol' 'truth is stranger than fiction' motif so well, especially in reference to what many women, specifically, deal with on account of their most basic interactions with men. Allison's trauma is palpable, and her constant desire to touch an actual hole in her head is both overt and somehow incredibly profound. Readers can't help but be uncomfortable, which seems intended, the entire way through this surprisingly stressful evolution of events and understanding.

It's always tough to read about a character's interactions with trauma, but this is really one of the most arresting descriptions of processing that trauma that I've encountered. Added to this riveting situation is the profound portrayal of Allison's experiences with her TBI. And just the evolution of the dudes in her life...if there's an award for guys outcreeping level 10 creepers, Allison gets my vote for finding the worst of the worst in every package. This is not what I'd call an uplifting read, but it is a fascinating one that I expect will stick with me for a long time and that has made me eager to bump up those several long-queued reads of Dermansky's and to recommend this one with all associated warnings.

I am such a huge fan of Dermansky’s work that I have been waited with bated breath to get my hands on an ARC of Hurricane Girl. I read it in one sitting and it did not disappoint! Allison Brody, thirty-two, wants to swim in the ocean every day, which is why she purchases a beach house in North Carolina. After a week and a half of bliss, the coast is hit with a category five hurricane that destroys her new home, leaving behind the detritus of her dream existence. Feeling unmoored, she’s interviewed by the local news and takes the cameraman up on his offer to stay with him. But Keith turns out to be an abhorrent human who leaves Allison with a skull injury and no choice but to return home to her mother in New Jersey where she is forced to face her past and her never-ending quest to submerse herself in water. Dermansky’s characteristic clipped sentences, penchant for dark humor and characters in flux shine throughout this buoyant novel.

Thank you to NetGalley and Knopf Doubleday Publishing Group for this ARC!

This book felt like a lighting strike--shocking, powerful, brilliant. (This applies to both Dermasky's plot and writing ability).

It totally swept me up and away. A one-sitting, engrossing, bizarre, gripping read.

Highly recommend.

This was an incredibly strange, bizarre little book but I couldn't help but enjoy it. I definitely want to check out more of Marcy Dermansky's other works.

Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for the free e-copy.

This is one wild ride of a book. I would be laughing and then it would be just horror. This story keeps you captivated the entire time. I couldn’t figure out what was going to happen next. This is a short and quick read but so worth it. I really loved the writing style. I highly recommend this book!!

It was very easy to get swallowed up by this book, an intriguing protagonist fleshed out by Dermansky's frank and frenetic writing style. But while reading, I felt like there was something missing—maybe if the book was bit longer, or if I understood Allison a bit more. The ending is very good. 3.5 stars.

This book was a RIDE. It was far less plot-driven than I was expecting -- while things do definitely happen, I feel like the story was more about the Allison's interior thoughts and her stream of consciousness than any specific plot point. That said, I don't think I was the right reader for this book. I didn't feel attached to Allison and couldn't figure out the overall point the author was trying to make with the book. I also didn't find anything particularly comedic or funny about it, despite many reviews and some of the marketing material billing it as such. But I do think it will find its audience, and I could see myself recommending it to readers who enjoyed My Year of Rest and Relaxation.

I've been in love with Marcy Dermansky's writing since Bad Marie and was thrilled to have the opportunity to read Hurricane Girl. Written with Dermansky's trademark simplicity, Hurricand Girl sneaks up on you, hooking you in before you realize that you are three-quarters of the way through the novel. The characters vibrate, three dimensional in their vulnerability, evoking both empathy and dismay - fully human. Another dark and moving treat from Dermansky. Now I'll just have to wait for the next book.