It should not have taken me this long to read my first Emily Austin novel, but lucky for me, and anyone else who’s in the same boat, We Could Be Rats was everything I wanted it to be and more.

The novel follows two sisters, Sigrid and Margit, and opens with Sigrid’s suicide letters to her family and friends. In those first chapters, we learn how alienated and lonely Sigrid feels among classmates, her family, and at home in Drysdale, their small, conservative town. She writes extensively about how she never really wanted to grow up, and that her childlike imagination became a coping mechanism to deal with family turmoil.

As the youngest sister, Sigrid felt that she was always working against the norm and should’ve been “more like Margit,” the people pleasing, over-achieving older sister. As I kept reading, it became clear to me that their dynamic was the crux of the story. The guilt that each sister felt with the way they treated each other in response to their environments, and the love they have despite those factors.

Thank you to Atria Books and NetGalley for the ARC.

Thank you to Atria books for the ARC of one of my most anticipated books this year!

I wasn't sure how I would feel about this book, because while I liked interesting facts about space, I didn't feel a strong connection to it. This, however, was unequivocally a book /for me/. This about a complicated relationship between two sisters who grew up in a tumultuous household, both dealing with that trauma in very different ways. I love book that explore sibling relationships, and this one was just so perfect. I loved reading about this sisterly bond and how their lives diverged, yet remained tethered through their family. The writing was great and I found myself immediately sucked in, mainly reading this in two sittings. I can't wait for this book to be out in the world for all to read!

We Could Be Rats, like many of Austin's other works, sneaks up on you, hitting you right through the heart before you have any time to emotionally prepare yourself as we follow two sisters, Sigrid and Margit, as they attempt to navigate the messiness of growing up and the relationships and losses that come with it. Austin's work never fails to read with such raw and genuine honesty, creating such lovable and real characters that make you feel seen in a way you didn't know you needed. The dark and sardonic comedy is a delight as always and acts as a great contrast to the heavy, nuanced topics while never detracting from the seriousness (only Emily Austin could make me laugh out loud while while reading different iterations of a suicide note). We Could Be Rats feels like a really exciting progression for Austin in how she utilizes the storytelling format and how her characters can have a greater effect on the story and its perception. While I don't think anything could ever beat Everyone in This Room Will Someday Be Dead as my favorite Austin book, this one is close behind! Let us all be rats and feast on this life together!!! 🐀❤️

Emily Austin writes outstanding characters and depicts the human experience so well. I really appreciate how honest her characters are. Serious topics are handled with care and humor. Her style of writing stands out as well, especially in this book. WCBR is full of heartache but worth a read!

An instant favorite for me. This story follows the narrative of a suicide note and the multiple attempts to write one that grants closure, comfort, and an overall view as to why Sigrid would want to take her own life. The twist however sent me into a tizzy and there is the matter of family dynamics, mental illness and trying to grapple with the world we live in.

WE COULD BE RATS by Emily Austin

ARC review | ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️| general fiction

Release date: January 28, 2025

Publisher: Atria Books

*check content warnings before reading.

Sigrid, a Dollar Pal employee who hates her job and isn't too fond of her hometown, Drysdale, either, is a twenty-year-old with a longtime resentment for growing up and leaving her childhood behind to behave as all adults do. She didn't graduate high school, and spent much of her time with her best friend Greta, wandering their town. As an adult, Sigrid is doing her best to exist beneath the weight of her childhood and teenage life, with parents who had explosive fights she still remembers and Greta's friendship lost to drug addiction. The novel also follows Sigrid's older sister, Margit, who doesn't understand Sigrid's personality or her resistance to adulthood. With complicated relationships and relatable questions regarding the nature of growing up, this book is about both Sigrid's detachment and Margit's desperate attempts to understand her sister.

This is by far one of my favorites; this book is moving, emotional, and hilarious as Emily Austin weaves together emotional memories, vital issues, and humor to create Sigrid and Margit's stories. I love how naturally this novel sheds light on important societal matters and the struggles of living in a small town filled with limited worldviews. It's imaginative, with a lot of emphasis on Sigrid's actual imagination, which influenced her childhood memories fundamentally, alongside her approach to growing up. A novel about Sigrid's navigation of her existence and her resentment of adulthood, 𝘞𝘦 𝘊𝘰𝘶𝘭𝘥 𝘉𝘦 𝘙𝘢𝘵𝘴 is a beautiful, real, and deep novel about childhood trauma, growing up, and coming to terms with your existence. With LGBTQIA+ representation, a celebration of sisterhood, true friendship, and genuine sadness, this book is an emotional adventure, and I loved every page.

Thank you to Netgalley, Atria Books, and Emily Austin for providing a review copy of this book! Make sure to grab your copy on January 28!

I really love when a story can make me feel something. Something that lingers with you for a moment or few days-after the story is over. “We Could Be Rats” does in fact do that.

Austin beautifully writes two POV’s of sisters - each opposite of one another, having their own perspective of their upbringing, relationships and struggles.
(Tw: suicide)

Without spoilers, the story is heartfelt in a gut wrenching way and yet still hopeful. The writing is solid, easy to navigate and the dual narration is unique. This one will sit with me for a while🥹

Thank you to NetGalley and Atria Books for the advance readers copy in exchange for my honest review.

I love lit fic about lesbians with complex and weird inner worlds.

This book is stunning. Humorous and insightful. Deeply touching. Austin did a fantastic job examining how interconnected people’s struggles are and how deeply other people’s pains and neuroses can affect those around them. A brilliant story of understanding and compassion.

Review: We Could Be Rats by Emily Austin

Austin has cemented herself onto my bookshelf with both Everyone in the Room Will Someday Be Dead (5 stars) and Interesting Facts About Space (4.5 stars). I find that each book since her debut has captured me a bit less with this one being somewhere on the cusp of 3.75-4 stars.

I will skip the summary as you can find that in multiple places.

Please note there are several sensitive topics (SA, DV, drug abuse, alcohol abuse, suicide etc.) and many are dealt with quite flippantly. This is not because they are unimportant but because the characters attempt to gloss over the issues or ignore them as a coping mechanism. That being said the topics discussed were not an issue for me at all, I actually appreciate that they were brought up. I also like how the characters normalize these issues because it is so ingrained in their life and/or as a way to simply keep going. This is a reality for many people and Austin depicts that very well and ultimately with care and respect.

The novel is divided into three parts: Sigrid’s (FMC) attempted suicide notes, making the first section epistolary format which I really enjoyed! Because the first section proves that the narrator is unreliable I never knew what to believe but that did not affect my experience, I enjoyed it to be honest. (I love chaos!) The second part was her sister Margit’s POV and the third and final part was Sigrid’s POV.


CONS
My biggest issue was with the first of the three sections as it got very repetitive. So much focus was on a fictional/childhood world that Sigrid wanted to escape to and it kept saying the same thing. Some details were included various times and it almost made me feel like she didn’t trust her readers to catch on or follow her thread. In a way, this worked because they were “drafts” of her suicide note, but at the same time I started to get bored. Furthermore, the first section talked so much about a desire to be a child forever and live in a world where imagination was King until it was overdone. We get it: Sigrid wants to escape adulthood, she is mourning the loss of her childhood, and she feels alone, but I do not care about cotton candy clouds and unicorns that much. Please move on from the same narrative.

This would have benefitted from shortening the first section and lengthening the second and third. I would have fewer qualms in section one if it were shorter and some of that info was transferred to the individual POVs.


PROS
Once I reached the second and third sections I was fully invested. I loved seeing the way Margit and Sigrid became two entirely different people despite growing up in the same hostile and abusive environment. I think Austin captures sisterhood so well, the way they loved each other and hated each other so passionately and unintentionally distanced themselves was very accurate. Yet, in the end, they were each other’s biggest fans and support systems.

Additionally, I liked the angst that Sigrid feels for the social climate that she is forced to live in. I love the mention of Indigenous issues even if it was brief, the acknowledgment of queer white privilege, homelessness, and in general the frustrations of living in a world that does not care about the effects it has on others.

Despite a turbulent opening to the book, I think Austin stuck the landing, I loved the ending!

This eARC was provided by Atria Publishing via Netgalley in exchange for an honest review. All thoughts and opinions are my own.

I will be posting to Goodreads, Storygraph and Instagram on January 28th.

Review to Be Posted:
⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

**"We Could Be Rats" by Emily Austin** is a quirky, heartfelt story about two friends navigating life, love, and all the messy bits in between. With sharp wit and a touch of melancholy, Austin captures the rawness of human connection and the awkward, beautiful chaos of finding yourself. At its core, this book is about friendship, identity, and the strange ways we try to figure out where we belong.

This one’s got it all—laugh-out-loud moments, emotionally charged scenes, and characters that feel like real people you’ve met (or maybe *are*). The writing is clever and sharp, pulling you in with its honesty and humor. While it dives into some heavier themes, it never feels too heavy, balancing the bittersweet with the hopeful. The pacing works well, and even when things slow down, you’re happy to hang out with these characters.

The only reason it’s not a five-star for me is that a couple of plot points felt a little too neat or predictable, but honestly, it didn’t take away from how much I enjoyed the ride. Emily Austin has a way of writing that feels so personal and intimate—it’s like sitting down for a heart-to-heart with a friend.

If you’re into books that make you laugh, cry, and think all at once, *We Could Be Rats* is worth picking up. It’s a charming, heartfelt read that’ll stick with you long after you’ve turned the last page.

Thank you to NetGalley and Atria Books for an eArc of this book in exchange for a honest, unbiased review!

This book made me feel everything. The first half is a collection of letters from the narrator, attempting to justify their suicide. At times, the letters were infuriating; other times, they were utterly heartbreaking. And just when I leaned too far into sentimentality, Emily Austin would pull the rug out from under me with her sharp, dry humor. Reading this part of the novel felt like being a detective—I was questioning existence, the narrator’s reliability, and even myself. The second half of the book flew by! It felt more grounded in reality, offering two distinct perspectives that added depth and context to the story. I know this book will stay with me for a long time. Having already read Everyone in This Room Will Someday Be Dead and now this, I can confidently say I’m a BIG fan of Emily Austin’s work!

It takes an incredibly skilled writer to craft a novel that explores loneliness, loss of innocence, trauma, drug abuse, socio-economic struggles, and the complexity of existing as a queer person in a world rife with judgment—even from your own family. Austin weaves these themes together masterfully, diving deep into the strained relationship between two sisters who’ve lost their connection, frustrated with each other’s ways of navigating the world. She also explores the dynamics of chosen family, showing how deeply you can love a chosen sister, even when her path diverges from yours.

This book is for everyone.
Read it if you identify with the main character.
Read it if you’ve ever made yourself small to please others.
Read it if you’ve felt lonely.
Read it if you’re trying to understand people different from yourself.
Read it to be a better ally.
Read it to challenge your perspective on the houseless community.

JUST. READ. THIS. BOOK.

Once again, I'm staring the new year with a new Emily Austin book. And once again, it's a 5 star read. aà
I'm not going to lie, there was a moment in this novel, where I felt that perhaps this particular story won't make it onto my favourites because it felt a little different than what l'm used to from this author.
However, in the second part of the book, we have a little bit of a perspective shift and here is where I understood what the author is doing, I got it and I fell in love.
Emily Austin just has that gift of making people feel seen. You don't necessarily have to relate to her characters, she will just pull out all the emotions that humans experience on regular basis - our struggles, mundanity and the complete silliness of life. There are the smallest moments or thoughts presented in this novel that will just suddenly make me feel so overcome with emotion. It's kind of like seeing an overly specific video on the internet and realizing that the weird thing you do when nobody's watching, is actually something that thousands of other people do as well. Except with way more tears because I can't help but get emotional reading about these characters.
If you've ever struggled with growing up in a small town (especially if you're queer), if you've ever disconnected from important friends or family members, if you've ever felt isolated and hopeless and completely stuck, read this book. Or read any other Emily Austin book.
I just love this author and I love that it feels like the biggest, warmest awkward hug that I always need around this time of the year.
content warning: this novel heavily discusses suicidal ideation, depression and mental health. There is also a mention of sexual assault.

Thank you to NetGalley and the publishers for a free eARC of this wonderful story in exchange for an honest review!

It’s official - I love Emily Austin! She has a gift of writing these quirky lovable characters in such a way that you are rooting for them from the beginning. This book was no exception. I loved this more than Interesting Facts About Space! I whipped through this in one day and enjoyed every moment.

I laughed out loud at times, and found myself teary in others. I also didn’t expect the twist halfway through, which I really think added another layer to the story. I absolutely loved the ending and I think this book serves up some really important reminders about life and what’s important - my favorite type of book!

I will so happily read whatever Austin decides to write next and I think this novel will be quite popular this winter, and for good reason!

1 Sentence Summary: Sisters Margit and Sigrid have never really understood each other, and now Sigrid is trying to write her own suicide note while Margit tries to figure out what went wrong; however, maybe confronting the past is the only way the two of them can move on and find their way back to each other.

My Thoughts: I just love Emily Austin’s writing style. I don’t even know how to describe it—striking? choppy? It’s kind of stream-of-consciousness, as if the narrator is just saying whatever is in their mind. It’s almost like she writes short, disjointed segments that maybe don’t seem like they make sense together, but then they somehow all create the most beautiful and emotional picture when they’re put together.
Also, the way she describes things feels so realistic. And dialogue?? The dialogue in this was incredibly written; it felt (for lack of a better word) very realistic.

The character development of Sigrid and Margit was amazing. I could totally relate to both of them, and they were both very three-dimensional, deeply flawed and yet human characters. They were characters that I could root for, and I was completely invested in their stories and what happened to them.

There were so many emotions in this book. At one point I was giggling and at another point I was on the verge of tears. I just think that Emily Austin captured the human experience so well here.

Also, I love books that focus on relationships between sisters, so this was right up my alley. Margit & Sigrid’s relationship was so complex and fascinating and well-written.

I loved reading this! It was really sad at times, but also hopeful and heartwarming. And the ending—wow. It really tied everything together while also leaving things open-ended.

Recommend to: People who enjoy stories about sisters, complicated families, and finding your way in the world.

(Warnings: swearing; mentions of rape; drug use/addiction; suicidal ideation & attempted suicide; death)

2.5 maybe?

This typically isn’t a book I would reach for, but im challenging myself to branch out and try new things. This book definitely resonated with me in the sense that not everyone is ready to grow up yet, and that sometimes there are real life consequences for that.

The dual POV is where it fell flat for me. I think the idea that Margit was talking through Sigrid makes it feel like the run time for them were very unequal. That being said, I didn’t feel like I truly got to know Margit other than hearing a little about her own struggles with mental health. I would’ve loved to hear more about her “after” and for the sisters to have a better reconnection at the end. There’s a lot unsaid, but I don’t think thats necessarily bad.

Regardless, I thought this was a great quick read that makes you think. It definitely hits home in some aspects of Sigrids story, as well as Margits.

we could be rats is a story about two sisters dealing with the trauma they endured both as children and adults. one is chaotic and distances herself from "normalcy", aggressively trying not to fit in, and the other is proper and overly attentive, desperate to do the "right thing." the topic is a dark one. one sister wants to kill herself as a result of everything she's been through, including watching her best friend struggle with an opiate addiction. however, emily austin manages to handle this with a tactful dark humor and an incredible amount of grace. it felt emotional without ever hitting you over the head with the message and the relationship between the sisters was honest and incredibly moving.

this takes different points of view depending where you're at in the book, whether it is letters, journal entries, or general narration, and i enjoyed the way that each flip of the narrative added another layer to the dynamics of the relationships portrayed. i do feel like this took a little while to get to the point and the "twist" following the first part of the book was a good shock but distanced me from the characters after already feeling invested.

however, i really enjoyed this book and would recommend it to anyone looking for an easy read with a wlw main character and complex family dynamic. somehow this is my first emily austin and i can't wait to read the rest of her work!

Emily Austin Writes weird, meandering, triggering prose where the most mundane words in the world seem prophetic. She writes relatable, morose lesbians better than anyone out there, The story of two sisters - one trying to escape life and the other trying to force herself into if - goes nowhere. Well, that’s not entirely true. Written (kinda) in dual POVs, the book explores Sigrid’s desire to kill herself and what she would leave behind and then Magrit’s response, The interplay of everyday life, trauma and growing up is engrossing, While I am sure some would say this book is unremarkable with no plot, those people would be missing the true beauty of both Austin’s writing and the realism of these sisters. Could not recommend more.

» READ IF YOU «
🐀 are captivated by stories of sisterhood
🎨 enjoy whimsical, imaginative litfic
💔 want to marinate in the complexities of loss and healing

» SYNOPSIS «
Sigrid and Margit are sisters navigating the challenges of adulthood in their small town. Sigrid, unwilling to conform to society’s expectations, finds solace in her friendship with Greta and their shared imaginative escapades. Margit, the more conventional sister, struggles to understand Sigrid’s choices. As they confront past traumas—including their parents’ tumultuous relationship and the impact of the opioid crisis—the sisters embark on a journey to rekindle their bond through the power of imagination.

» REVIEW «
Wow, this book was a rollercoaster of emotions! I was completely engrossed in Sigrid and Margit’s story. The way Emily Austin portrays the complexities of sisterhood and personal growth is both heart-wrenching and uplifting. The imaginative elements woven into the narrative added a whimsical touch that I absolutely adored. I couldn’t put it down and found myself reflecting on the story long after I finished reading. Highly recommend!

⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

This book was phenomenally written, a beautiful look into the mental health impacts of young queer people in the current political landscape. It was relatable, heartfelt, funny, and deeply moving. This was my first Emily Austin novel, and it certainly won't be my last.

You can find more thoughts on my full review on instagram: https://www.instagram.com/p/DElcQBvyXda/?img_index=1

Emily Austin writes weird, thoughtful, meandering books that really work for me. We Could Be Rats features two very different sisters, one of who attempts suicide. It is heavy but so funny at times with relatable family dynamics. The book has an interesting structure that worked well for the story and kept me guessing.