Editorial Content for Greta & Valdin
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Reviewer (text)
The family at the heart of Rebecca K Reilly's debut novel, GRETA & VALDIN, are probably most likely to be compared to J.D. Salinger's iconic Glass family (even the title is reminiscent of Salinger's FRANNY AND ZOOEY). But as I was reading, I kept casting my mind back to one of my favorite childhood series, the Bagthorpe Saga by Helen Cresswell. Like the Bagthorpes, Reilly's Vladisavljevic family is eccentric, intelligent and prone to emotional fragility, and readers' first impression might be one of a glorious, confusing, muddled mess.
Part of this stems from Reilly's approach to exposition. It takes readers many chapters to figure out basic facts such as characters' occupations, relationships and names (though the list of dramatis personae at the book’s opening helps (as it does in many Russian novels, from which Reilly also seems to draw some inspiration). There are a lot of characters, many of whom share the same name. All of this becomes clear, but for the first 50 pages or so, readers may have the distinct feeling of being dropped into a wedding or family reunion, without a clear sense of family dynamics, backstories or inside jokes.
"Reilly's writing is charmingly deadpan, and her characters are true originals. Greta and Valdin's relationship is perhaps the most touching."
However, things do gradually become clear, and readers eagerly will go along for the ride as soon as they're introduced to the distinctive voices of the title characters, who narrate most of the story in alternating chapters. Greta and Valdin are siblings in their 20s. Older brother Valdin is nursing a broken heart after the end of a relationship with Xabier (known as Xabi), who also happens to be their uncle's husband's brother. Valdin recently has embarked on a somewhat unexpected career trajectory. After years studying physics (and finally realizing that academic research made him miserable), he's now the host of a travel show on television.
Younger sister Greta, who's earning her master's degree in comparative literature, also has been unlucky in love, though that may be about to change when she meets Ell, a graduate student in biology. It's a little awkward that Ell is in Greta's dad's department at the university, but that's hardly the biggest relationship complication that arises. Among other things, Greta is concerned that their mother (a Māori youth theater producer) may be harboring feelings for an old flame. Their father (also named Valdin but always called Linsh), who emigrated from Moldova to New Zealand when he was a child, is altogether too trusting, if not entirely clueless. A specialist in marine fungus, his mind is often a million miles away from the concerns that plague the rest of his family.
If this all sounds complicated, it is, in the best possible way. The Vladisavljevic family members are smart, vulnerable and often very funny. Reilly's writing is charmingly deadpan, and her characters are true originals. Greta and Valdin's relationship is perhaps the most touching. Even as they start to look to romantic partners to form new kinds of families, they desperately need to keep one another as friends, touchstones and confidantes. One gets the sense that countless other stories could come out of this family. If Reilly hosts a family reunion, readers will be eager to crash the party.
Teaser
It’s been a year since his ex-boyfriend dumped him and moved from Auckland to Buenos Aires, and Valdin is doing fine. He has a good flat with his sister Greta, a good career where his colleagues only occasionally remind him that he is the sole Maaori person in the office, and a good friend who he only sleeps with when he’s sad. But when work sends him to Argentina and he’s thrown back in his former lover’s orbit, Valdin is forced to confront the feelings he’s been trying to ignore --- and the future he wants. Greta is not letting her painfully unrequited crush get her down. She would love to focus on the charming fellow grad student she meets at a party and her friendships with a circle of similarly floundering twenty-somethings, but her chaotic family life won’t stop intruding.
Promo
It’s been a year since his ex-boyfriend dumped him and moved from Auckland to Buenos Aires, and Valdin is doing fine. He has a good flat with his sister Greta, a good career where his colleagues only occasionally remind him that he is the sole Maaori person in the office, and a good friend who he only sleeps with when he’s sad. But when work sends him to Argentina and he’s thrown back in his former lover’s orbit, Valdin is forced to confront the feelings he’s been trying to ignore --- and the future he wants. Greta is not letting her painfully unrequited crush get her down. She would love to focus on the charming fellow grad student she meets at a party and her friendships with a circle of similarly floundering twenty-somethings, but her chaotic family life won’t stop intruding.
About the Book
The “brilliant” (Daily Mail, London) bestseller that follows a brother and sister as they navigate queerness, multiracial identity and family drama, all while flailing their way to love --- for fans of "Schitt’s Creek" and Sally Rooney’s NORMAL PEOPLE.
It’s been a year since his ex-boyfriend dumped him and moved from Auckland to Buenos Aires, and Valdin is doing fine. He has a good flat with his sister Greta, a good career where his colleagues only occasionally remind him that he is the sole Maaori person in the office, and a good friend who he only sleeps with when he’s sad. But when work sends him to Argentina and he’s thrown back in his former lover’s orbit, Valdin is forced to confront the feelings he’s been trying to ignore --- and the future he wants.
Greta is not letting her painfully unrequited crush (or her possibly pointless master’s thesis, or her pathetic academic salary) get her down. She would love to focus on the charming fellow grad student she meets at a party and her friendships with a circle of similarly floundering twenty-somethings, but her chaotic family life won’t stop intruding: her mother is keeping secrets, her nephew is having a gay crisis, and her brother has suddenly flown to South America without a word.
Filled with “kernels of humor and truth” (Elle) and with an undeniable emotional momentum that builds to an exuberant conclusion, GRETA & VALDIN careens us through the siblings’ misadventures and the messy dramas of their sprawling, eccentric Maaori-Russian-Catalonian family. An acclaimed bestseller in New Zealand, GRETA & VALDIN is fresh, joyful and alive with the possibility of love in its many mystifying forms.
Audiobook available; read by Natalie Beran, Jackson Bliss, Eilidh Beaton, Nico Evers-Swindell and Gary Furlong
