Someone You Can Build a Nest In
by John Wiswell
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Pub Date Apr 02 2024 | Archive Date Apr 09 2024
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Description
A Most-Anticipated Book of 2024 from: Amazon, Polygon, io9, Apple Books, Goodreads, Reactor, Book Riot, Writer’s Digest, and Nerd Daily
A Washington Post, Book Riot, and Audible Best Book of 2024
“This unusual queer romance is a heartfelt fable about disability and the possibility of reconciling conflicting needs through love and understanding.” —The Guardian
"Sweetly furious, darkly funny, and gruesomely wholesome. It's a love story for the unloved, a happily-ever-after with a higher-than-average body count. I just adored it." —Alix E. Harrow, New York Times-bestselling author of Starling House
Shesheshen has made a mistake fatal to all monsters: she's fallen in love.
Shesheshen is a shapeshifter, who happily resides as an amorphous lump at the bottom of a ruined manor. When her rest is interrupted by impolite monster hunters, she constructs a body from the remains of past meals: a metal chain for a backbone, borrowed bones for limbs, and a bear trap as an extra mouth.
Badly hurt by the hunters, Shesheshen’s nursed back to health by Homily, a warm-hearted human. Homily is kind and would make a great co-parent: an ideal place to lay Shesheshen’s eggs so their young can devour Homily from the inside out. But as they grow close, Shesheshen realizes that eating her girlfriend isn’t an option.
Just as Shesheshen’s about to confess her identity, Homily reveals something else: she’s hunting a shapeshifting monster that supposedly cursed her family. Has Shesheshen seen it anywhere?
Shesheshen didn’t curse anyone, so now she has to figure out why Homily’s twisted family thinks she did. As Shesheshen’s hunt for the monster becomes increasingly deadly, the bigger challenge remains: learning how to build a life with, rather than in, the woman she loves.
“A stealthily funny, slyly smart, and remarkably touching story. Its wisdom will creep up on
you as surely as your affection for its monstrous main character.”—Veronica Roth, #1 New York Times-bestselling author of When Among Crows
Available Editions
| EDITION | Other Format |
| ISBN | 9780756418854 |
| PRICE | $28.00 (USD) |
| PAGES | 320 |
Available on NetGalley
Featured Reviews
Katie M, Reviewer
This book is an absolute wild ride of a read, and it was incredibly enjoyable throughout. It's definitely not for everyone - I'm not recommending it for family book group, for example. However, for people for whom, "lesbian shapeshifting blob disembowels and absorbs girlfriend's abusive family members...for love!" hits the sweet spot, it's an absolute slam dunk. Yeah, it's a little gory, but there's an amazing amount of tenderness and humanity that I found super relatable. It's also got a great message about how "monsters" might have more humanity than the humans, and that humans can be monsters too; the different is not in how you're perceived, but how you treat others. Honestly, a book that can give me goopy digestive juicy gore, a tender exploration of familial trauma, and the joy and confusion of falling in love all in one is absolutely a five star read for me. This is the kind of book that I wouldn't have expected to get published, but I'm thrilled that it did, and I hope it finds its way into the hands of other readers for whom it resonates like it did for me.
Reviewer 1024996
Ordinarily one wouldn’t use the words absolutely adorable to describe a book that discusses at length various bodily fluids, bones, and an Alien style hatching, but here we are. This book was probably the surprise of the year for me. I was intrigued by the description and then blown away by the execution. The novel follows Shesheshen, a blob of not really human flesh but with an appetite for it, grappling with human nature, family dynamics, and battling her own nature for the one she loves. I love originality in a book and this one certainly delivers, and there were several twists I certainly wasn’t expecting. Very much enjoyed, thank you NetGalley for the opportunity to read and review.
Christina W, Bookseller
What a fun and wild ride! Innovative monster idea and witty yet psychologically subtle story with almost more unexpected turns than the main character possesses stolen organs. Perfect for fans of smart and queer novels such as "Gideon the Ninth" "Legends & Lattes", "Empire of the Vampire". Will certainly recommend this new fantasy gem.
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