I was intrigued by the plot of Dunbar's debut novel. I also love plot themes that rotate around "living off the grid."
The main character, Elsa, faces a decision after her husband experiences a tragic accident. To complicate The family lived “off the grid” in the rugged Wisconsin forest. Elsa is now alone and must work to keep her family thriving in this way of life.

I very much enjoyed the narrator--the very experienced Cassandra Campbell brings an extra special quality to the story. I have always enjoyed her narrated books.

Thank you to NetGalley for a copy of this audiobook.

The Net Beneath us falls into the category of literary fiction, following a family after a death. The story is lengthy and can be quite heavy as they journey through grief.

In this novel, Elsa, a young mother, learns that her husband has been killed. She is left alone in an unfinished home in the woods and manages to live off the grid and care for her 2 young children. I enjoyed how the author created complex and nuanced characters. I also liked how grief was portrayed from not only Elsa's point of view, but that of other characters as well.

The audiobook is just over 10 hours and narrated by Cassandra Campbell. She gave a lovely performance and I enjoyed the audio experience.

Thanks to Macmillan Audio, NetGalley, and Carol Dunbar for the opportunity to listen to “The Net Beneath Us” in exchange for my unbiased review.

Literary fiction can be a hit or miss for me, depending on the pacing of the novel, and this one fell somewhere down the middle for me.

Overall, I enjoyed the audiobook and narration choice, and felt like this book really made me reflect on my own life and the relationships in my life. Cassandra Campbell was the narrator, and she has become one of my all time favorite narrators.

*many thanks to Macmillan Audio and Netgalley for the gifted copy for review

Thank you NetGalley and Macmillan Audio for accepting my request to audibly read and review The Net Beneath Us.

Author: Carol Dunbar
Published: 99/13/22
Narrator: Cassandra Campbell
Genre: General Fiction (Adult)

Cassandra Campbell is one of my favorite narrators. I have to watch myself to not pick a book because she is performing. Seeing her name does make me stop and evaluate the book.

This story was okay. I like the perspective writing. Unfortunately, there was a period of time that dragged. After the accident, things changed at home (I'm not spoiling). What happened to the mice? were they rats? what went under the stove? There were questions but no answers. The dynamic of a family changes and so do roles. I found the water supply issue and fix interesting. But what happened to the solar panels?

There were a lot of missed opportunities for growth or failure. While the story was lagging, the ending was rushed. Where did it come from?

I'm giving 2.5 stars and rounding up, perhaps I missed the point of the story.

In a Nutshell: A debut literary fiction about the journey of a family through grief and loss. Well-written, but ponderous. You need to be in the right mood for this – it gets pretty gloomy at times. If you are an audiobook listener, go for the audio.

Story Synopsis:
Elsa has just received devastating new: Silas, her logger husband, has met with a serious accident. Now it is up to Elsa to take care of her house in the woods, manage living off-the-grid just like Silas wanted, take care of her two little children – five year old Hester and not-even-a-year-old Finn, and also stay true to her own desires while maintaining an open communication with her in-laws – Silas’ Uncle Ethan and Aunt Luvera. Will city-bred Elsa be able to handle life on this rural farm without her husband’s help?
The story is written in a third person limited perspective of various characters and covers the period of one year beginning with the accident.

Where the book worked for me:
🌹 A literary fiction is nothing without well-sketched characters, and this one is a winner in that department. Every single main character comes in various shades of grey. Each of them is battling some or the other regret. As the narrative voice flits across each of them, you truly get to understand them, empathise with them, and sometimes, even get frustrated with them. The characters feel real and none of them are depicted as perfect. The contrast between Luvera and Elsa’s approach to life adds well to the drama.
🌹 A major chunk of the story comes from Elsa’s perspective, and it is her character that provides the greatest dramatic effect in the story. Her stubbornness, her courage, and her independence are balanced by her moping over “what-if”, her strained relations with her family, and her uncertainty about what to do next. She carries the story well on her shoulders.
🌹 It would have been so easy to portray the grief only from Elsa’s point of view but the author shines an equal spotlight on all of her key characters. I admired her decision to also give a voice to little Hester’s feelings. She is one adorable girl and her angle elevates the story to a whole new level.
🌹 The story covers almost all feelings that come with life-changing news – shock, anger, depression, resignation, hope, faith, courage, moving on… It does justice to most of these emotions. The way the grief-handling is written, you don’t just view the pain of the characters but actually feel it with them.
🌹 There is an underlying feel of authenticity to the portrayal of living life off the grid. The blurb indicates that the author has drawn on her own experiences to show the wonder and harshness of such a lifestyle. That’s probably why it feels so genuine. Loved the realistic depiction.
🌹 The story is set in Northern Wisconsin, and thought I haven’t ever been there, I could still see the landscape through the beautiful visualisation. I am sure locals will appreciate it even more.
🌹 For a debut work, the writing is amazingly nuanced. Obviously, you know where it is going, but in literary fiction, the journey is of greater value than the destination.
🌹 Loved the metaphorical title – suits the story so well.

Where the book could have worked better for me:
🌵 Too intense on the feelings. My fault, not the book’s. I should have read it at some other time.
🌵 The story attempts to shove in some paranormal feels. (Or maybe, magical realism is the better word for these elements.) It broke the grounded feel of the plot.
🌵 There are too many things happening to too many characters in the novel – a common feature of a character-driven story. But while most worked well, I wasn’t at all happy with one element in the Tommy track. It felt forced in to create a shock effect and didn’t proceed logically from Elsa’s character.
🌵 To a certain extent, the plot makes use of the found family trope. While this works mostly well, the reason why they weren’t as connected with each other when Silas was active doesn’t come out well. Some of Elsa’s antagonism feels baseless and I never quite understood why she was so adamant about not accepting help from Ethan and Luvera.

The audiobook experience:
The audiobook, clocking at a little more than 10 hours, is narrated by Cassandra Campbell. She is one of my favourite narrators, and as such, I am not surprised by the brilliance of her performance. She brought this book alive in the best way possible. Not many narrators can do justice to children’s voices without sounding funny or whiny. But I loved her voice for both Hester and Finn.
Moreover, this is a very slow-paced book, so audio is definitely a better way for you to experience the story without its feeling dragged.

This book is in many ways healing, and in equal ways, frustrating. But overall, it offers a story that does justice to its intention. Recommended to fans of character-driven literary fiction who won’t mind the slower pace. Go in when you are mentally prepared for an intense emotional experience.

4 stars.

My thanks to Macmillan Audio and NetGalley for the ALC of “The Net Beneath Us”. This review is voluntary and contains my honest opinion about the audiobook.

I really loved this book - it made me think of the people in my life and how we all create nets for others. The amount of hard work and grit shown by this.charactet was so inspiring. This was a lovely read that I would recommend to others.

This was about grief and all the challenges of trying to move forward, but it was also about family and finding meaning. The grief jumped off the page at me and tried to hold me there. I thought at one point that I might not be able to go on. But slowly it showed me the journey and shared pain that we all feel. There’s nothing happy about this one but there was hope and meaning. The writing was good and it was refreshing to see details and feel what the author describes.
I chose to listen to this book on audio and Cassandra Campbell narrated this one and she’s the best. She’s one of my favorites and love her voice. I highly recommend listening to this.
Thanks Macmillan Audio via NetGalley.

Elsa’s husband is first in a coma and then dies in a logging accident. She is left with two young children, living off the grid in the woods in rural Wisconsin. Elsa is out of her element living off the grid, which was her husband’s dream, without him. My heart ached for Elsa and her children while reading this slow-paced, emotional read. Life goes on after loss and this family had to learn how to make that happen. This was a fantastic debut by Dunbar. I look forward to reading other stories of hers in the future. The character development was strong in every character that was introduced into the story. This was a story about loss, strength and learning to lean on others when it is needed.

An exquisite debut novel about love, friendship, nature and the struggle to survive. Elsa and Silas were world apart when they net and fell in love. Silas, a logger in rural Wisconsin, Elsa, a city girl with an affluent background but she willingly follows him to start their new life in an environment that is completely alien to her. He starts building them a house, they have two children, life is hard but their is plenty of love. Then disaster strikes and Elsa must learn to survive and thrive, learn how to manage, learn to lean on those who are willing to help.

A quiet book but an emotional one. Wonderful, fully realized characters with beautiful descriptions of nature. One can't help but sympathize with Elsa, want her to succeed though I admit to wanting to shake her at times. Help is available but is she too proud to ask, accept when help is offered?

Such a good, heartfelt story. Looking forward to her next novel.

The narration by Cassandra Campbell is terrific.

A powerful story of a woman living off the grid and grieving the loss of her husband. I loved all of the characters and how they worked together and became a family. I especially loved the sections that were from the point of view of the young daughter. It is a story of grief and ultimately hope.

This was, simply put, an utterly stunning book. (And may I say that the audiobook narrator knocks it out of the park in bringing the book to life)

This is the story of Elsa, a woman who moved to live off the grid with her husband Silas in a new home they're building. Along with their two children, they're as blissfully happy as can be. Silas's aunt and uncle (Luvera & Ethan) who raised him after his father passed, live nearby too.

The book quickly becomes a story about a mother being forced to find a way to survive and raise 2 children after devastating loss. How to move forward in this home and land that now seem foreign, how to deal with the future you planned crashing down around you.

What's wonderful is that the book doesn't just focus on how Elsa is affected, but on both of the children as well as Luvera and Ethan. The author does a beautiful job of digging into each character and their unique journeys. To see the experience of loss through the eyes of 3 different generations of family really gives you a greater understanding of how the pain of loss and how we react is truly a unique experience for everyone.

However, as heart-breaking as the story is, it's also very uplifting to see these characters find resilience they never knew they had and to see how they grow beyond what they thought they had and how they gain strength from each other

Such an easy 5-star rating to give!


(Thank you to NetGalley and MacMillan Audio for a copy of this audiobook in exchange for my honest feedback)

Rating: 4/5⭐️
Pub day: 9-13-2022

Welp, I was NOT prepared for this very emotional read. There was one particular moment in the first few chapters where I absolutely wept. Real tears rolling down my face while I tried to keep my s*** together because I didn’t want to freak my daughter out! 😂

This wonderful debut has a slower pace but is packed full of insightful moments and a wide range of characters. A deeply emotional tale about loss, strength, and finding what is needed most in each person’s life.

I did a combo of audio and digital and both were wonderful. The audio is done by one narrator, but I never found it lacking when she altered her voice for different characters. Really impressive debut, I’m excited to see what Dunbar writes next!

Thank you Macmillan Audio, Macmillan-Tor/Forge, and Netgalley for the arc & alc in exchange for an honest review!

Could you ever live off the grid? The introvert in me would love to answer yes to this question, but let’s be honest, I could probably last a week at most. I’ve always been fascinated by individuals who choose to live this challenging lifestyle, so the synopsis of The Net Beneath Us by Carol Dunbar grabbed my attention immediately. Elsa’s husband is involved in a logging accident, and her life is turned upside down. The care of their two small children is now left on her shoulders alone. Oh, and did I mention that they live in an unfinished house in rural Wisconsin? Her life gets pretty stressful really quickly. I loved the character growth displayed by Elsa in this novel. She frustrated me at times, but I admired her strength and determination. I couldn’t help but root for her, and want her to succeed. With themes of motherhood, marriage, loss, grief, healing, and self-reliance, this debut will appeal to many readers. The Net Beneath Us releases next week - Tuesday, September 13th. Be sure to grab a copy of this captivating story. I give it 4.5/5 stars! Highly recommend!

Thank you to NetGalley and Macmillan Audio for this ARC.
I listened to The Net Beneath Us by Carol Dunbar on audiobook.

I was a bit disappointed in this story but that is perhaps because of my own short-sightedness when initially viewing the book description.

I wanted a story that - as the description in part reads - “…vividly describes the wonder and harshness of life off the grid,” In reality, this is a women’s novel exploring grief and family issues with life in rural Wisconsin almost an afterthought.

I also am familiar with narrator Cassandra Campbell, and have never disliked her reading, but I found myself thinking that this book read flatly, and it this bored me at times. I also found the children’s dialogue annoying - whiny and abrasive to listen to.

The story was true to many women’s fiction books I have read in that the narrative would branch off into mini-stories about secondary characters before coming back to the main story.
I found this frustrating as well, but again, this is a personal bias, as women’s fiction is a genre I infrequently choose to read. (Again, I had mistakenly thought it would be more of an adventure tale of city-girl-survives-country-life.)

I did very much enjoy the parts of the story that detailed the realities of rural farm life, though. The story’s ending also came together, if in a convenient platitude, satisfactorily.

Three stars.

A beautiful look inside of a family who suffers loss and how life must go on without the one you love. "Grief isn't just about the person who you lost it's about losing the person who you were when you were with them and who you go on to become."

This literary fiction captures vivid descriptions of life in rural Wisconsin with Silas, his wife, Elsa and their two small children. Elsa comes from a privileged background in the city and falls in love with Silas, a simple farming and logging man against her father's wishes. He is building them a home and it is left half finished when Silas is fatally injured in a logging accident. He is considered brain dead, but after turning his life support off he manages to hang in there for two more weeks. Elsa after being prodded by her in-laws, agrees to take him home and take care of him.

The hardships she endures while taking care of two small children and her husband is more than you can bear sometimes. I could feel her fatigue, her grief and her hardships under these cruel conditions, but she keeps in mind her love for Silas and how he dedicated his life to her.
Her reflection on his goodness compared to her unappreciative actions is full of regrets of what she should have said while he was alive. Her strength would falter and then regain for the sake of all he worked for. This is a touching and momentous debut of how proud people struggle and relying on others is unfathomable. The struggles are real and based on the author's own experiences in these harsh conditions. Great job! I'm sure there will be more from this author.
Thank you NetGalley and Macmillan Audio for this ARC in exchange for my honest opinion.

Thought provoking in some ways. I enjoyed the book itself. I'm not so sure about the narration. I’d recommend this book to people who enjoy personal stories and trials. All around I think it was missing some stuff/details but it was an interesting read. There was a lot to unpack I feel like so if you enjoy light reads I would not recommend this book. The book was told from different perspectives and that can sometimes be hard to follow but it added more depth and personality/feelings to the characters. 3 ½ stars for me!

The Net Beneath Us really hit home. What a stunning book. Written in lyrical prose this book explores so many emotions and tears the heart open just a tiny bit. Searing and thought provoking not only does the reader dive into issues like marriage and death and family but we also come to understand the healing power of trees.
When Elsa loses her husband in a logging accident she has no clue how much her life will change. Left alone with her two young children and bereft after her husband dies the story is unputdownable.
Both full of heartbreak and hope this book is a must read.
Thank you to netgalley and publisher for the audio ARC in exchange for my honest review

THE NET BENEATH US by Carol Dunbar is beautifully written, evocative, and thought-provoking. Sprinkled with metaphors and symbols from the healing nature of the land, trees, and forest.

Like nature and humans, there are vast contrasts. Both beautiful and dangerous. Trees and their wisdom are essential elements of the novel, reflective and meditative. THE BRAVE TREE.

Between Dunbar's evocative and lyrical prose and Cassandra Campbell's flawless and emotional narration of this captivating audiobook, THE NET BENEATH US is a "must-read" debut for fans of literary fiction. A spellbinding novel of survival and hope.

He promised her he would never let go.
She's willing to risk everything to hold on.

A story of a young family, Silas, and Elsa, building their home in rural Wisconsin. When a logging accident changes everything. Silas is in a coma.

Wife and mother, Elsa, must maneuver and determine the best way to remain on the land with two small children with no running water or conveniences. A brutal winter is approaching. There is no firewood for heat, and she has no help. She is haunted by her regrets and determined to stay put. But how?

With two small children and the rough winter approaching, she pushes herself to be self-reliant when she cannot depend on her in-laws or others. She takes comfort in the trees and nature her husband loved. She is wracked with grief and regret. She must stay in this home when others think she should leave.

She digs deep inside herself, but she must accept help from others. She struggles with staying and a lot of manual work, too much for a single woman, or leaving the land her husband loved to move back to modern society and conveniences. She is conflicted.

In alternating chapters, told from four main characters' POVs: Else, her five-year-old daughter, Hester, and her late husband's aunt and uncle, Luvera, and Ethan.

Luvera and Elsa are in many ways opposites as women. Luvera is a practical farm wife; Elsa is a dreamer who paints.

All four of the main characters in this story are struggling with their regrets. Luvera regrets never having children; Ethan regrets not going out for one last beer with his brother; Elsa realizes that Silas was the "greatest love of her life, and she'd reciprocated that love too late.

When a stranger shows up, Big Al, Elsa, is not sure he can be trusted.

A lyrical exploration of loss, marriage, parenthood, and self-reliance. From regrets, loss, despair, grief, survival, joy, love, acceptance, and healing.

A stunning debut, I cannot wait to read more from this author. I highly recommend the audiobook, as Cassandra Campbell is always a favorite narrator.

Full of heart told over a year, Dunbar draws from her experience living off the grid in Northern Wisconsin.

A special thank you to #MacmillanAudio and #NetGalley for an ALC for an honest review. #SMPInfluencers

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@JudithDCollins |#JDCMustReadBooks
My Rating: 5 Stars
Pub Date: Sept 12, 2022
Sept 2022 Must-Read Books

Thank you to the publishers, author and NetGalley for the free copy of this audio book.

Definitely went through every emotion while listening to this. It has a lot of heartbreak but also hope for the characters! It did feel a little slow at times but overall a good read, and the narrator did a good job.

This book helped me step back and realize what is really important. I am really happy with the ending. I like the way they used nature to help her process her grief and self sufficiency.