The Push by Ashley Audrain @audrain @PenguinCanada

Brenda’s review

Hot Emotional Diggity Dang! If you haven’t read this one, it is one you don’t want to miss! Put on your lounge pants and lock yourself in a room because you won’t want to put it down once you start it. It’s one you will want to talk about!! It is a book I am so excited to share with everyone. I want to stand in a book store and hand it to everyone who comes in and tell them they have to read it. It has been a long time since a story has made me feel like this one did—that feeling of being spent emotionally yet completely satisfied. It’s the best way to feel after reading a book.

We are expected or think we are good mothers, have the perfect children, and the ideal relationship with them, right? Well, Ashley Audrain boldly challenges that expectation here and shows us a compelling, complex story that explores the bonds of mother and daughters and motherhood’s dark, uncomfortable, emotional realities. The things we hide, burying our heads and don’t push by talking about it. She weaves a well-layered, emotionally intelligent story with suspense elements to create an absorbing psychological drama that is not to be mistaken for a psychological thriller. I went in thinking this was going to be a dark, twisted, entertaining psychological thriller and I started to worry it would go in the direction of those bad mother and psychology tropes and that the over thinker in me would come raging out. Thanks to my reading twin Jen who picked up on some things I didn’t, I started thinking differently about this one. Thank you, Jen!! I had nothing to worry about! It would be easy for this story to fall into those harmful tropes; however, Ashley Audrain pushes for better here.

The story is told almost entirely in second-person narrative from Blythe to her husband, Fox. Ashley Audrain creates one of the best opening scenes I have read to set up suspense, a sense of foreboding, and an ominous feel to the story. I wished from the start I would have checked that thriller mind of mine and paid more attention to Blythe’s tone to the story and picked up more of her feeling of self-doubt. Blythe is a relatable character and Audrain does a good job of putting us in her shoes allowing us to feel with her.

The title is brillant and worth thinking about and we spend some time talking about it and how it relates to the story.

There is so much more to this story to talk about, and so much I want to say, but I will leave it at this. I recommend this one to readers who love a well, developed psychological drama with depth layers.

This was a Traveling Sister read and one we all highly recommend!!

Lindsay’s review

Even better than I had hoped. Gut wrenching. Most emotional and amazing book I’ve read in years!

“A mother’s heart breaks a million ways in her lifetime.”

Blythe struggles to connect with her newborn daughter and worries that her own traumatic childhood has damaged her ability to properly bond and nurture as a parent. She battles these thoughts on a daily basis and pushes herself through the endless stress-filled days of parenting a young child. Things seem to be easier once her son is born.

Emotionally draining and compulsively readable. This is one of the most intense and amazing books I’ve read in years. I was quite literally addicted to this book….to this mother’s pain and her struggles. I was rooting for Blythe. My heart broke every time hers did which was a constant ache from start to finish.

The writing! I don’t know how to adequately describe the beauty of the writing. The writing flowed directly into my heart and had me feeling as though I was experiencing the heartache and struggles right alongside Blythe. My connection and investment in Blythe’s situation was so strong due to the exceptional writing that I felt as though it was happening to me. Quite simply — I was Blythe while I read this. I have no personal experience with what Blythe went through but I feel like a changed person after reading this. This moved me so deeply.

This is not a happy book. It is brutally honest and raw. It will rip your heart out. It will make you feel the pain of a mother fighting her own thoughts and worries.

I know it’s very early in the year, but I think this will be my favourite book of 2021. This will be extremely hard to top. I usually move right on to the next book once I finish reading but the intensity of this one forced me to take a break to think and truly absorb the situation. Major book hangover! I feel bad for whatever book I pick up next….

We received a copy form the publisher through NG