LoveReading Says
LoveReading Says
Finding the love that’s always been right in your face is at the heart of Liv Little’s Rosewater, a read-in-one sitting joy that fizzes with the desires, disappointments and dreams of 28-year-old Londoner, Elsie.
A confirmed “queen of no-strings”, to quote one of her friends and regular hook-ups, Elsie works in her local gay bar on an impossibly low wage, and longs to land a publishing deal for her poetry. Largely estranged from her family, when the worse happens with her flat, she moves in with her best friend, with escalating complications. The truth of how darn difficult it is to survive on a low income, how hard it is to find creative work that pays, and how having no stability “can fuck with a person” is brilliantly explored. As Elsie remarks in the wake of being dealt disappointing blow after disappointing blow, “Fucking life. Never stops, does it?”.
And that’s the case for all aspects of Elsie’s existence. Alongside her financial and creative struggles, Elsie’s family relationships are strained, though there are glorious moments with her Guyanese grandma.
In time, Elsie also finds moments of elation as Little lays bare complex truths of the heart, the nature of love and desire, and the power of staying true and strong. Elsie’s story will have readers rooting for her along every step of her passionate path.
Joanne Owen
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About
Rosewater Synopsis
A deliciously gritty and strikingly bold debut novel about discovering love where it has always been.
Elsie is a sexy, funny, and fiercely independent woman in South London. But, at just 28, she is also tired. Though she spends her days writing tender poetry in her journal, her nights are spent working long hours for minimum wage at a neighbourhood gay bar.
The difficulty of being estranged from her family, struggle of being continually rejected from jobs, and fear of never making money doing what she loves, is too great. But Elsie is determined to keep the faith, for a little longer at least. Things will surely turn around. They have to.
As she tries to breathe through the panic attacks, sleeping with her hot and spirited co-worker Bea isn't exactly straightforward and offers Elsie just another place to hide.
As Elsie tries to reconnect with her best friend Juliet, her fragile world spirals out of control. Can Elsie steady herself and not fall through the cracks?
About This Edition
| ISBN: |
9781408717066 |
| Publication date: |
25th April 2024 |
| Author: |
Liv Little |
| Publisher: |
Dialogue Books an imprint of Dialogue |
| Format: |
Paperback |
| Pagination: |
336 pages |
| Primary Genre |
General Fiction
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| Other Genres: |
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| Recommendations: |
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Press Reviews
Liv Little Press Reviews
Beautiful. . . Rosewater is essential South London. It is Black queer history. It is messy love and pure love and deep friendship. It is written by someone who understands those things intuitively. It is your Nan's pepper pot and roti, food for the sweet parts of your soul.
And yeah, perhaps most importantly, it's bloody readable! I raced through it in 24 hours. -- Charlie Brinkhurst-Cuff Rosewater is a story so wonderfully imbued with a sense of family, community and the importance of finding your place in the world-but more than anything, it's a stunning exploration of the ways in which friendship can deepen into an unbreakable bond of romantic love. I consumed it in breathless gulps. -- Sareeta Domingo No book has captured the dialogue of millennial black London so well and this book manages to be socially aware without it feeling forced. Rosewater brings to life the London at the vanguard of culture and all the challenges facing them: housing insecurity, low pay, sexual frustration and monogamy in a city where non-monogamy can feel more enticing. The lead characters are complex, cool and sexy, and the supporting cast even more rewarding. Rosewater's protagonists are the Queer grand daughters' of Selvon's Lonely Londoners and this is a modern Black British love story that will become a future classic. -- Symeon Brown Rosewater is a confident debut, brimming with ideas and bursting with heart. It manages to get to the core of what it means to be young and open your heart today. Liv Little continues to be a gamechanger with this novel - I am in awe. -- Nikesh Shukla Liv writes with ease, creating natural and effortless prose that is quietly powerful. The kinda love oozing from characters I've always wanted to see on the pages -- Travis Alabanza A wonderfully fresh, zesty and sexy debut novelist who is putting black queer lives, loves and longings centre stage, where they belong. -- Bernardine Evaristo Rosewater is funny, witty, messy, and beautifully queer...a story that seeps into you the way warm sunshine does at the final edges of winter -- Nicole Dennis-Benn Bold and beautiful . . . [a] bracing contemporary voice -- Mike Jackson, John Legend and Ty Stiklorius Little gifts us with a novel that tells of the love, courage, grace and power of a connection and a softness that propels us through the messy, harsh realities of life and self discovery- to know yourself through the love that knows you. Elsie is loveable and frustrating and swaggering and vulnerable, a wonderful protagonist. Frank, sexy, and so tender. Little's pen shines. -- Bolu Babalola Rosewater feels like a song for the dreamers who are trying to find their way. It is a wonderful, messy, heart-filled novel. -- Jendella Benson Liv Little's Rosewater is the book we've all been longing to read. It's tender, soulful, and sexy, and once I started this book, I couldn't put it down. Liv's unique and lyrical voice tells a story that breaks your heart before putting it back together again, and Elsie, unapologetic in her Blackness, queerness, and everything in-between, is a young woman many will be able to relate to. A jewel of a debut novel. Brava, Liv! -- Phoebe Robinson, New York Times bestselling author of You Can't Touch My Hair and Please Don't Sit on My Bed in Your Outside Clothes
