Yesteryear: A GMA Book Club Pick

The writing is so snappy it crackles. The characters’ are both visible and audible. Humans in general and women in particular come off badly in this satire biting enough to draw blood. Reminiscent of The Truman Show, Yesteryear is less prescient, but it walks the tightrope strung between truth and lies with remarkable agility. Natalie Heller Mills and her Caleb will not soon be forgotten.

This is one of the most unique books I have read in a long time. At no point while reading it did I know where it was going. It was bizarre and tongue in cheek with a sci-fi, time traveling, mysterious element to it.I am teetering between 3 and 4 stars, and honestly would probably rate it 3.5 if that were an option, so I am rounding up to 4. Because although I am not sure I would readily recommend it for fear it may not be everyone's cup of tea, I did read it quickly, and usually when I did pick it up it, it was able to hold my attention for long periods of time!I don't know what genre I would put it in. I think people are classfying this book as a mystery and I would probably have to agree with that. I feel the mystery genre is a little too pigeonholed for this book, but I don't know where else I would put it. There is definitely a huge satire component and there were moments when I had to laugh at the irony. I feel the author got some of her ideas for the book from a particular popular Instagram influencer with a farm that starts with the letter "B". 🤭Also, this book has already had some major buzz around it with Anne Hathaway starring and producing the upcoming movie based on it, and here recently with rumors of it being a Book of the Month choice for April, so it is definitely going to be everywhere in the foreseeable future if that is something that interests you. I think it is going to be a weird movie, but I am interested to see what Anne Hathaway does with it!The entire time I was wondering where this book was going and how it was going to end and I was definitely surprised by it! I did not see that coming. 😂

Reminiscent of I Am Charlotte Simmons, and that is not a compliment.Not really, but it had the same bloated reviews promising insightful social satire but instead failed. Seriously, the woman is to blame? The premise is that Natalie actually lost her mind and recreated 1855, and committed child abuse in the process? Maybe throw in a few homeschooling stereotypes to boot? No thanks. I really was excited to read this but hated it.

This arrived on my doorstep yesterday afternoon and I finished it this morning - not because it was an easy ready but because I devoured it. It has been a very long time since I read a book that captivated my attention so completely that I could not put it down. I am stil digesting the story, which I have classified as horror. I will be thinking about this for a while.

From the outside looking in, Natalie has the perfect life. She lives on the picturesque Yesteryear Ranch, tucked into the quiet hills of Idaho. Her husband, Caleb—a ruggedly handsome cowboy—runs the agricultural side of the farm, while Natalie raises their six seemingly perfect children. She shares their simple, rustic, all-natural lifestyle with over eight million followers, who watch with envy.But if social media has taught us anything, it’s that nothing is ever quite as it seems.In reality, Natalie relies on a team of nannies to wrangle the kids while she maintains her carefully curated image. Her live-in producer, Shannon, ensures everything runs smoothly behind the scenes. And Caleb? He’s never successfully grown a plant or kept an animal alive. Natalie secretly employs real farmers to keep the ranch functioning under the cover of night. Oh, and Caleb is also having an affair with Shannon.This picture-perfect life is nothing but a façade, and it’s about to collapse.After discovering the affair and Shannon’s sudden resignation, Natalie retreats to her bedroom, overwhelmed. When she awakes the next day, something is…off. She’s still in the same house, but Caleb is older—years older—and strangely competent. The children are there, but they aren’t her children. And all the modern conveniences that sustained her life are gone. No nannies. No producer. No electricity. No running water.Has Natalie somehow slipped into the very past she’s been pretending to live in? Or is something far more unsettling at play? Whatever this is, if she wants to salvage her life—and the empire built on it—she’ll have to find a way out.With Yesteryear, Caro Claire Burke bursts onto the literary fiction scene with a debut that may be one of the most original novels I read all year. There’s a sharp, biting irony in forcing a character to confront the harsh realities of the lifestyle she’s built a brand on promoting, but the exploration of hypocrisy is only the beginning of what Burke has in mind.Burke alternates between Natalie’s present-day predicament and glimpses into her past, gradually constructing the version of her we meet at the novel’s start. It’s a smart, effective structure that deepens our understanding of an admittedly complex and often frustrating protagonist. As Natalie struggles to make sense of her situation, the novel expands into a thoughtful meditation on motherhood, womanhood, religion, politics, and the performative nature of life in the age of social media.I found myself completely absorbed, eager to uncover the truth behind what was happening. The answer is as bold as you might expect from a novel this daring, though I suspect the ending will prove divisive for some readers. Even so, I was captivated from beginning to end. Yesteryear is a striking debut novel that will almost certainly make my list of favorite reads of the year.