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All This Could Be Different
Graduating into the long maw of an American recession, Sneha is one of the fortunate ones. She's moved to Milwaukee for an entry-level corporate job that, gruelling as it may be, is the key that unlocks every door: she can pick up the tab at dinner with her new friend Tig, get her college buddy Thom hired alongside her, and send money to her parents back in India. She begins dating women--soon developing a burning crush on Marina, a beguiling and beautiful dancer who always seems just out of reach.
But before long, trouble arrives. Painful secrets rear their heads; jobs go off the rails; evictions loom. Sneha struggles to be truly close and open with anybody, even as her friendships deepen, even as she throws herself headlong into a dizzying romance with Marina. It's then that Tig begins to draw up a radical solution to their problems, hoping to save them all.
But before long, trouble arrives. Painful secrets rear their heads; jobs go off the rails; evictions loom. Sneha struggles to be truly close and open with anybody, even as her friendships deepen, even as she throws herself headlong into a dizzying romance with Marina. It's then that Tig begins to draw up a radical solution to their problems, hoping to save them all.
320 pages, Hardcover
First published August 2, 2022
About the author
Sarah Thankam Mathews
3 books312 followersThankam: thun like thunder, gum like gumdrop. Mathews with one T: the Keralite way. Any pronouns. Grew up between Oman and India, immigrating to the US in my late teens. Organizes sometimes: climate, immigration, mutual aid.
Debut novel All This Could Be Different, shortlisted for the 2022 National Book Award, Discover Prize, Aspen Literary Prize. Work in Best American Short Stories 2020 and other places. Proud product of public schools. Lives in Brooklyn, New York. Grateful for anyone who has read my book!
Debut novel All This Could Be Different, shortlisted for the 2022 National Book Award, Discover Prize, Aspen Literary Prize. Work in Best American Short Stories 2020 and other places. Proud product of public schools. Lives in Brooklyn, New York. Grateful for anyone who has read my book!
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 2,266 reviews
September 26, 2023
suddenly decided i could not be happy without reading this book.
and that was the correct decision!
this was extremely grueling and stressful to read. i hate when i am confronted with my own self in a book via a complicated, hard to like, unwell, sometimes selfish, exquisitely real and human character — i hate to be around myself!!
for all its stressors and its too real depiction of how cruel and self-centered we are, how inextricably awful and power-hungry and evil society can be, this is hopeful and beautiful and by the end i liked it so much.
but not at the beginning or middle.
bottom line: ultimately worth the struggle!
3.5
and that was the correct decision!
this was extremely grueling and stressful to read. i hate when i am confronted with my own self in a book via a complicated, hard to like, unwell, sometimes selfish, exquisitely real and human character — i hate to be around myself!!
for all its stressors and its too real depiction of how cruel and self-centered we are, how inextricably awful and power-hungry and evil society can be, this is hopeful and beautiful and by the end i liked it so much.
but not at the beginning or middle.
bottom line: ultimately worth the struggle!
3.5
April 26, 2023
guys.. i did it... i found a contemporary book about being a first-gen/immigrant asian american that i liked!!! and bonus: it's gay!!!!!!!
it's frank. it's funny. it's honest without being trauma porny. it has texting that doesn't feel like it's trying too hard to be ~relatable~ but definitely sounds like how zillennials text. it talks about what it's like to be asian american -- that feeling of always being out of place without being explicitly out of place, the desire to be a good student and good worker and live up to what your parents came to america for -- without whining or waxing poetic. like, the racist microagressions actually feel like microaggressions instead of "i got made fun of for eating stinky tofu", you know?
my more ~professional~ review for work:
"[white people] get to own their lives. they get to feel like their lives belong only to them ... not like all my choices are mortgaged to the people who have made my life possible"
I've been looking for this book for a long time: a sensual, sharp, blithely funny bildungsroman that actually captures the spirit of the Asian American immigrant experience. Not the whiny, woe-is-me trauma porn, but the real shit, the microaggressions that make you second-guess your sensitivity, the deeply engrained desire to succeed in the game of capitalism so your parents' sacrifices don't go to waste, the distinct feeling in your gut that you're out of place always -- until you find a home. And it's that found family that Sarah Thankam Mathews creates here, a beautiful vision of a better world built from the efforts of our society's strongest individuals: minorities.
it's frank. it's funny. it's honest without being trauma porny. it has texting that doesn't feel like it's trying too hard to be ~relatable~ but definitely sounds like how zillennials text. it talks about what it's like to be asian american -- that feeling of always being out of place without being explicitly out of place, the desire to be a good student and good worker and live up to what your parents came to america for -- without whining or waxing poetic. like, the racist microagressions actually feel like microaggressions instead of "i got made fun of for eating stinky tofu", you know?
my more ~professional~ review for work:
"[white people] get to own their lives. they get to feel like their lives belong only to them ... not like all my choices are mortgaged to the people who have made my life possible"
I've been looking for this book for a long time: a sensual, sharp, blithely funny bildungsroman that actually captures the spirit of the Asian American immigrant experience. Not the whiny, woe-is-me trauma porn, but the real shit, the microaggressions that make you second-guess your sensitivity, the deeply engrained desire to succeed in the game of capitalism so your parents' sacrifices don't go to waste, the distinct feeling in your gut that you're out of place always -- until you find a home. And it's that found family that Sarah Thankam Mathews creates here, a beautiful vision of a better world built from the efforts of our society's strongest individuals: minorities.
October 9, 2022
Okay so I loved the portrayal of class dynamics in this novel. All This Could Be Different follows Sneha, a young queer Indian woman who graduates college during the Great Recession and moves to Milwaukee to take an entry-level corporate position. I thought Sarah Thankam Mathews did a great job portraying Sneha’s economic anxiety and how she connected her sense of self-worth to her income and career. Mathews also shows Sneha’s struggle with emotional intimacy and her journey to eventually open up and form more healthy relationships with her close friends, which I enjoyed reading. The compelling prose, strong themes related to class and culture, and emphasis on community make this novel stand out to me in a positive way.
At the same time, I felt frustrated by the centering of whiteness in All This Could Be Different. At the beginning of the book Sneha’s Black friend Tig tries to kiss her, and Sneha *literally* has the thought that she only wants physical intimacy with thin white women. Which, you know, is definitely yikes, fatphobic, and reeks of internalized racism, though unfortunately I know quite a few Asian Americans who feel similarly. My issue is that Sneha’s internalized racism, proximity to whiteness, and fatphobia are never actually interrogated in the novel – instead she engages in an obsessive and sometimes toxic relationship with a white woman, Marina (who commits several racial/ethnic microaggressions against Sneha/Indian people), that is centered throughout the book. While I enjoyed Sneha’s friendship with Tig, I did feel a little uncomfortable by how it seemed that Tig kind of served to teach Sneha how to actually care about racial justice. Especially because Marina, a white woman, is centered throughout the book in no way that actually benefits Sneha’s growth or character development!
So yeah, I’m pretty much over media that portrays people of color in dysfunctional relationships with white people in which they literally don’t grow beyond their own internalized racism. More stories like Transcendent Kingdom by Yaa Gyasi that portrays romance between people of color or A World Between by Emily Hashimoto which highlights romance between queer people of color. Or, if you’re going to tackle the issue of internalized racism and dating among people of color, do it in a way that actively challenges white supremacy, like Disorientation by Elaine Hsieh Chou. I’ll end my review by pointing to this review of All This Could Be Different by Goodreads user Sitaphul that describes similar issues with the novel, with more depth and quality than my review.
At the same time, I felt frustrated by the centering of whiteness in All This Could Be Different. At the beginning of the book Sneha’s Black friend Tig tries to kiss her, and Sneha *literally* has the thought that she only wants physical intimacy with thin white women. Which, you know, is definitely yikes, fatphobic, and reeks of internalized racism, though unfortunately I know quite a few Asian Americans who feel similarly. My issue is that Sneha’s internalized racism, proximity to whiteness, and fatphobia are never actually interrogated in the novel – instead she engages in an obsessive and sometimes toxic relationship with a white woman, Marina (who commits several racial/ethnic microaggressions against Sneha/Indian people), that is centered throughout the book. While I enjoyed Sneha’s friendship with Tig, I did feel a little uncomfortable by how it seemed that Tig kind of served to teach Sneha how to actually care about racial justice. Especially because Marina, a white woman, is centered throughout the book in no way that actually benefits Sneha’s growth or character development!
So yeah, I’m pretty much over media that portrays people of color in dysfunctional relationships with white people in which they literally don’t grow beyond their own internalized racism. More stories like Transcendent Kingdom by Yaa Gyasi that portrays romance between people of color or A World Between by Emily Hashimoto which highlights romance between queer people of color. Or, if you’re going to tackle the issue of internalized racism and dating among people of color, do it in a way that actively challenges white supremacy, like Disorientation by Elaine Hsieh Chou. I’ll end my review by pointing to this review of All This Could Be Different by Goodreads user Sitaphul that describes similar issues with the novel, with more depth and quality than my review.
October 3, 2022
Sitting with how conflicted I feel about this book. On the one hand, this book is simply a feat. The writing is electric, Mathews really uses language in new ways. I was so taken by the narrative voice, I couldn’t put the story down. Mathews rendered the precarity of a recession as a vehicle for a precise critique of capitalism, through the lens of a queer South Asian narrator who is on a work visa and unsure of whether she will be able to stay in the US, while her parents have already been deported to India. The way Mathews’ crafted scene, described setting, and moved deftly through time, the way in which she withheld information and also returned to particular themes that pulled through the whole narrative, it was all so skillful and a testament to how she used structure. I appreciated how Mathews held and deepened relationships over time, and how she planted literary devices throughout the story that come to fruition later. The depiction of Sneha’s depression and isolation felt so familiar, and I enjoyed so much of Mathews metaphorical writing. I credit her prose, pacing, and structure with keeping me completely pulled in. I want to reread this book purely from a craft standpoint. The writing is really good.
Still, I was puzzled by the centering of whiteness in the book, specifically through the characters of Marina and Thom. Apart from the very real, painful aspects of how Sneha negotiated her own queer identity while with Marina, I honestly couldn’t rustle up an interest in either of these relationships, even though they were posed as central, and seemed to be a bit pedestalized by Mathews. It’s sort of like when you meet the person a good friend of yours has raved about, and you know that person isn't as great as your friend thinks they are, and there’s nothing you can do about it. Marina and Thom were grating, and I didn’t feel the emotional weight or heft of Sneha’s relationship with either of them. I just had to suspend certain aspects of myself as a reader and believe there was connection there, because the prose kept me in the story. I will always bristle at the longing for a white girl who will save your life, which is reinforced by an industry that continues to spotlight and enlarge this dynamic as a central theme of South Asian stories around love. I will say there are many South Asians in the diaspora who do not live with this sort of existential longing for the white body, often because of the white violence we have experienced (amongst many other realities) AND we've held resistance to this longing that plagues both our own racialized communities/peers and white media, even in our coming of age 20’s. It made me wish the projects of South Asian US diaspora literature & TV (Mindy, Aziz, Jhumpa etc.) weren't built around this exhausting trope, of brown people for white people, of brown people obsessed with whiteness - this can’t be the only way to be seen as an artist. Some of us have sociopolitical identities that aren’t based on this deeply psychosexual relationship with whiteness, and as someone who consumes lots of story, it’s one of the least interesting aspects of South Asian diasporic storytelling. I know the centering of relationships with white people has to do with gatekeeping in publishing, which revolves around maintaining white privilege at the root of our stories about love. I hope that we’ll be able to liberate this trope one day. This isn't the only story to tell.
I also thought that Mathews made problematic choices about Tig and KJ, two central characters in the book who are Black/African-American, particularly in the way they were posed against Marina and Tom. The ways in which Sneha articulated her lack of attraction to Tig, because they weren’t white or thin, as well as an evaluative reference to Tig's “fupa,” at a time where Sneha’s relationship to Tig is meant to be the deepest, was troubling given that Sneha’s preference for a white woman (Marina) is subjectively accepted from an authorial standpoint (even if Sneha is derisive of Marina’s whiteness at times). I wish this was wrestled with a bit more, it’s odd to me that Sneha could have such a complex inner world, but not question this about herself. Strangely, Tig is also given a white girlfriend by the end, which Tig and Sneha chuckle about. The descriptions of Marina as “birdlike,” as airy and light, as a dancer - there was a juxtaposition to descriptions of Tig that felt wholly unscrutinized by Mathews. Also, the fact that Tig can’t read, and KJ has serious substance use issues, and that they both end up related, unbeknownst to Sneha and Amit, like, why this set of decisions? Tig and KJ somehow both look to Sneha and Amit for money (why?!) - which brings up “complex" feelings for Sneha and Amit. I don’t know, this felt like Brown martyr/saviory, middle-class, navel-gazing stuff that is meant to frame two South Asian characters in a particular, somewhat sympathetic way, versus a real conversation about the redistribution of wealth (if that was the goal of that narrative thread). I thought it was odd that Tig and KJ are both isolated from Black community throughout - again, this is a common representation I see in all sorts of media when people are writing across race, or when there isn’t a Black writer in the room, this need to remove Black characters from Black community because the writer may not know what that looks like. To me, the definition of community Mathews gives to Tig feels somewhat diluted in order to be inclusive of Thom (a person I immediately thought was ridiculous, who generally sucks, and who represented a low bar on friendship, but somehow Tig “automatically" gets along with him with no question, and he becomes saviory in the pat ending - I didn’t understand the construction of this character) AND Sneha (who is given mighty wide allowances) - it really matters that a Desi writer is inventing the idea of community for a Black character. What about definitions of community that are centered in other formations, like Black Abolitionism? In some ways, to be conveniently inclusive of Sneha and Thom in order to serve this idea of community, it sort of felt like an erasure of Blackness and the possibility that Tig and KJ could have held community in other ways too. The way Sneha implants and imagines her own identity into Tig’s plan, at the very moment when Tig is speaking to her about it, followed by Sneha’s smug commentary, like, the only reason we are being asked to have an iota of care about what Sneha thinks about Tig’s visioning, of Sneha’s “warming” to the idea, is because it is a construction of community that is likely specific to the author. (Let’s not even get into the real estate fantasy at the heart of the ending). Even if Sneha’s distance to the people in her life is partly formed by trauma, why doesn’t Tig get to have a reaction to Sneha, why don’t they get to consider whether Sneha genuinely loves and sees them (I questioned this through to the end)? I understand we are meant to witness all of Sneha’s harm with clear eyes, that she isn’t meant to be “likable,” she fumbles like we all do, but I don’t know, there are also many aspects of Sneha on the page that I felt need to be looked at from the standpoint of craft and authorial decisions.
There was even a small comment where Sneha called someone a “fivehead” which made me take great pause. Besides feeling artistically trespassy, it didn’t make sense to me coming out of Sneha’s mouth. Could this line also be about the ways in which South Asians artists appropriate the language and speech of other communities in their work, for credence? In the end, this novel didn’t quite feel like the story about community it was sold as, but maybe most communities have these rivers of unexamined things running through them. This story is about friendship, but it is also largely about needing to be deeply seen by white people (both the characters and readers), and my feeling about this obsession is, WHO CARES? Or rather, why can't we frame it differently, spin it on its head? In the end, I wish we had enough complex narratives about the South Asian US diaspora, where this particular story would be one aspect of a larger heaving, moving, and alive literary landscape.
Still, I was puzzled by the centering of whiteness in the book, specifically through the characters of Marina and Thom. Apart from the very real, painful aspects of how Sneha negotiated her own queer identity while with Marina, I honestly couldn’t rustle up an interest in either of these relationships, even though they were posed as central, and seemed to be a bit pedestalized by Mathews. It’s sort of like when you meet the person a good friend of yours has raved about, and you know that person isn't as great as your friend thinks they are, and there’s nothing you can do about it. Marina and Thom were grating, and I didn’t feel the emotional weight or heft of Sneha’s relationship with either of them. I just had to suspend certain aspects of myself as a reader and believe there was connection there, because the prose kept me in the story. I will always bristle at the longing for a white girl who will save your life, which is reinforced by an industry that continues to spotlight and enlarge this dynamic as a central theme of South Asian stories around love. I will say there are many South Asians in the diaspora who do not live with this sort of existential longing for the white body, often because of the white violence we have experienced (amongst many other realities) AND we've held resistance to this longing that plagues both our own racialized communities/peers and white media, even in our coming of age 20’s. It made me wish the projects of South Asian US diaspora literature & TV (Mindy, Aziz, Jhumpa etc.) weren't built around this exhausting trope, of brown people for white people, of brown people obsessed with whiteness - this can’t be the only way to be seen as an artist. Some of us have sociopolitical identities that aren’t based on this deeply psychosexual relationship with whiteness, and as someone who consumes lots of story, it’s one of the least interesting aspects of South Asian diasporic storytelling. I know the centering of relationships with white people has to do with gatekeeping in publishing, which revolves around maintaining white privilege at the root of our stories about love. I hope that we’ll be able to liberate this trope one day. This isn't the only story to tell.
I also thought that Mathews made problematic choices about Tig and KJ, two central characters in the book who are Black/African-American, particularly in the way they were posed against Marina and Tom. The ways in which Sneha articulated her lack of attraction to Tig, because they weren’t white or thin, as well as an evaluative reference to Tig's “fupa,” at a time where Sneha’s relationship to Tig is meant to be the deepest, was troubling given that Sneha’s preference for a white woman (Marina) is subjectively accepted from an authorial standpoint (even if Sneha is derisive of Marina’s whiteness at times). I wish this was wrestled with a bit more, it’s odd to me that Sneha could have such a complex inner world, but not question this about herself. Strangely, Tig is also given a white girlfriend by the end, which Tig and Sneha chuckle about. The descriptions of Marina as “birdlike,” as airy and light, as a dancer - there was a juxtaposition to descriptions of Tig that felt wholly unscrutinized by Mathews. Also, the fact that Tig can’t read, and KJ has serious substance use issues, and that they both end up related, unbeknownst to Sneha and Amit, like, why this set of decisions? Tig and KJ somehow both look to Sneha and Amit for money (why?!) - which brings up “complex" feelings for Sneha and Amit. I don’t know, this felt like Brown martyr/saviory, middle-class, navel-gazing stuff that is meant to frame two South Asian characters in a particular, somewhat sympathetic way, versus a real conversation about the redistribution of wealth (if that was the goal of that narrative thread). I thought it was odd that Tig and KJ are both isolated from Black community throughout - again, this is a common representation I see in all sorts of media when people are writing across race, or when there isn’t a Black writer in the room, this need to remove Black characters from Black community because the writer may not know what that looks like. To me, the definition of community Mathews gives to Tig feels somewhat diluted in order to be inclusive of Thom (a person I immediately thought was ridiculous, who generally sucks, and who represented a low bar on friendship, but somehow Tig “automatically" gets along with him with no question, and he becomes saviory in the pat ending - I didn’t understand the construction of this character) AND Sneha (who is given mighty wide allowances) - it really matters that a Desi writer is inventing the idea of community for a Black character. What about definitions of community that are centered in other formations, like Black Abolitionism? In some ways, to be conveniently inclusive of Sneha and Thom in order to serve this idea of community, it sort of felt like an erasure of Blackness and the possibility that Tig and KJ could have held community in other ways too. The way Sneha implants and imagines her own identity into Tig’s plan, at the very moment when Tig is speaking to her about it, followed by Sneha’s smug commentary, like, the only reason we are being asked to have an iota of care about what Sneha thinks about Tig’s visioning, of Sneha’s “warming” to the idea, is because it is a construction of community that is likely specific to the author. (Let’s not even get into the real estate fantasy at the heart of the ending). Even if Sneha’s distance to the people in her life is partly formed by trauma, why doesn’t Tig get to have a reaction to Sneha, why don’t they get to consider whether Sneha genuinely loves and sees them (I questioned this through to the end)? I understand we are meant to witness all of Sneha’s harm with clear eyes, that she isn’t meant to be “likable,” she fumbles like we all do, but I don’t know, there are also many aspects of Sneha on the page that I felt need to be looked at from the standpoint of craft and authorial decisions.
There was even a small comment where Sneha called someone a “fivehead” which made me take great pause. Besides feeling artistically trespassy, it didn’t make sense to me coming out of Sneha’s mouth. Could this line also be about the ways in which South Asians artists appropriate the language and speech of other communities in their work, for credence? In the end, this novel didn’t quite feel like the story about community it was sold as, but maybe most communities have these rivers of unexamined things running through them. This story is about friendship, but it is also largely about needing to be deeply seen by white people (both the characters and readers), and my feeling about this obsession is, WHO CARES? Or rather, why can't we frame it differently, spin it on its head? In the end, I wish we had enough complex narratives about the South Asian US diaspora, where this particular story would be one aspect of a larger heaving, moving, and alive literary landscape.
November 21, 2022
I am at a loss for words with this book, which is truly a masterpiece, an incredible success in so many ways it's hard to know where to start. It's one of the best books I've ever read, one of the only books I've read that felt so viscerally real but at the same time so brilliantly crafted as a work of fiction. The sentences frequently stunned me with their sharp insight, exquisite beauty.
It's an intimate, generous, and honest portrait of Sneha, a woman in her early 20s. Sneha is an aloof, emotionally cautious woman making her way in that daunting post-college period in an American recession as an immigrant from India. Her parents have returned to India, the reason why a slow unfolding as the story inches forward.
The novel focuses as much on friendship, work, and the practical details of life as it does on Sneha's first major romantic relationship, with a New Jersey dancer named Marina. Her evolving friendship with Tig – a fellow queer person of colour Sneha originally meets on a dating app – is a highlight. Her racist, passive aggressive property manager sent chills down my spine and brought back harsh memories of the brutalities of renting.
There's an ample amount of food and sex in this book, described so lusciously it almost hurt to read. The constant bearing down of capitalism, the small (and not so small) indignities Sneha endures at work are difficult to endure, painful to read in an entirely different way. I've never read such a millennial book, one that felt written by and for our generation, one that felt so recognizably like my own and my friends' lives. What a gift.
If you only read one contemporary / lit fic book this year, All This Could Be Different should be it. If you read audiobooks, I definitely recommend that format, majestically performed by Reena Dutt.
Read Kayla Kumari Upadhyaya's review at Autostraddle for a much more eloquent take on why this novel is so amazing: https://www.autostraddle.com/all-this....
It's an intimate, generous, and honest portrait of Sneha, a woman in her early 20s. Sneha is an aloof, emotionally cautious woman making her way in that daunting post-college period in an American recession as an immigrant from India. Her parents have returned to India, the reason why a slow unfolding as the story inches forward.
The novel focuses as much on friendship, work, and the practical details of life as it does on Sneha's first major romantic relationship, with a New Jersey dancer named Marina. Her evolving friendship with Tig – a fellow queer person of colour Sneha originally meets on a dating app – is a highlight. Her racist, passive aggressive property manager sent chills down my spine and brought back harsh memories of the brutalities of renting.
There's an ample amount of food and sex in this book, described so lusciously it almost hurt to read. The constant bearing down of capitalism, the small (and not so small) indignities Sneha endures at work are difficult to endure, painful to read in an entirely different way. I've never read such a millennial book, one that felt written by and for our generation, one that felt so recognizably like my own and my friends' lives. What a gift.
If you only read one contemporary / lit fic book this year, All This Could Be Different should be it. If you read audiobooks, I definitely recommend that format, majestically performed by Reena Dutt.
Read Kayla Kumari Upadhyaya's review at Autostraddle for a much more eloquent take on why this novel is so amazing: https://www.autostraddle.com/all-this....
August 5, 2022
Things this novel does well:
- doesn't tell you details about any character (race, ethnicity, sexual orientation, immigration, even name) unless and until they are salient, including the protagonist
- there's absolutely no self-exoticization
- narrator assumes reader knows what she knows including South Asian words and dishes
- narrator assumes reader agrees with her as she grows in her awareness of gender identities, American culture, and experiences of capitalism
- is political without being polemical
- characters come across as more than mouthpieces for authors political views (rarer these days than you'd think!)
- a love letter to a city that doesn't get regular love letters
- appreciation of project management work that often gets derided as bullshit in novels like these
- protagonist is prickly, imperfect and damaged
- so is everyone else
- everyone ends as happily and realistically as they should
Also I personally loved that while I'm not a lot like the protagonist,
- the precarity of being on a work visa and obsession with feeling safe is real, phew!
- the Indian parents are just like my Indian parents more so than any immigrant parent caricatures I've read yet
- the Amit is just like an Amit I know
This novel starts off like it's going to be formulaic - a 20-something finding love and climbing the corporate ladder - just brown and I guess queer this time. I didn't expect much more for a long time. But then it impressed me again and again as it unfolded. I'd just like to thank the author for this. It's going to be one of my reading highlights of 2022.
- doesn't tell you details about any character (race, ethnicity, sexual orientation, immigration, even name) unless and until they are salient, including the protagonist
- there's absolutely no self-exoticization
- narrator assumes reader knows what she knows including South Asian words and dishes
- narrator assumes reader agrees with her as she grows in her awareness of gender identities, American culture, and experiences of capitalism
- is political without being polemical
- characters come across as more than mouthpieces for authors political views (rarer these days than you'd think!)
- a love letter to a city that doesn't get regular love letters
- appreciation of project management work that often gets derided as bullshit in novels like these
- protagonist is prickly, imperfect and damaged
- so is everyone else
- everyone ends as happily and realistically as they should
Also I personally loved that while I'm not a lot like the protagonist,
- the precarity of being on a work visa and obsession with feeling safe is real, phew!
- the Indian parents are just like my Indian parents more so than any immigrant parent caricatures I've read yet
- the Amit is just like an Amit I know
This novel starts off like it's going to be formulaic - a 20-something finding love and climbing the corporate ladder - just brown and I guess queer this time. I didn't expect much more for a long time. But then it impressed me again and again as it unfolded. I'd just like to thank the author for this. It's going to be one of my reading highlights of 2022.
October 19, 2022
I AM NOT THE SAME WOMAN I WAS BEFORE I READ THIS BOOK 🔥
January 24, 2023
Audiobook….read by Reena Dutt
…..10 hours and 37 minutes
2022 National Book Finalist
The author, Sarah Thankam Mathews grew up between Omen and India. She immigrated to the United States at age seventeen.
This is her debut.
“All This Could Be Different”…. captured my attention right away….
….that interest dropped occasionally-but then it picked back up….
By the end….after sitting and thinking more about this story ….it was the themes and issues that I’m left thinking about…..and I think Sarah Thankam Mattews did a really great job capturing the challenges that millennials are bombarded with….(not completely without flaws - nor is our protagonist)….
but the fact of the matter many millennials even before Covid have faced low-paying jobs, unemployment, technology addictions, college debts, caretaking for aging parents, race and sexual identity discrimination, substance alcohol and sex addictions, violence and bullying, and a variety of mental health issues.
The dialogue, especially is good…..centered around friendships relationships and a young adult community —coming of age—socioeconomic concerns (thank you Capitalism) — communal living — C-PTSD - hardships from being an immigrant - a complex queer love story — all during very turbulent times.
We meet Sneha at an interesting/challenging time in the States….during a recession. As a millennial, Sneha has just graduated college ….. she takes an entry-level corporate job… moves to Milwaukee. Her parents have been deported in India.
And…..
…..Life begins to go haywire — having me think …. it’s much more challenging to face life as a 20-year-old than it does during the earlier teen years.
Sneha makes many mistakes - but she’s also dealing with (not dealing), with childhood trauma.
I liked it…. not over-the-moon swooning over it….but I had a warm heart for Sneha….the issues to contemplate and even the author’s writing style.
The prose feels honest….
with the humor and tender moments balancing the sadness of the conditions of life.
…..10 hours and 37 minutes
2022 National Book Finalist
The author, Sarah Thankam Mathews grew up between Omen and India. She immigrated to the United States at age seventeen.
This is her debut.
“All This Could Be Different”…. captured my attention right away….
….that interest dropped occasionally-but then it picked back up….
By the end….after sitting and thinking more about this story ….it was the themes and issues that I’m left thinking about…..and I think Sarah Thankam Mattews did a really great job capturing the challenges that millennials are bombarded with….(not completely without flaws - nor is our protagonist)….
but the fact of the matter many millennials even before Covid have faced low-paying jobs, unemployment, technology addictions, college debts, caretaking for aging parents, race and sexual identity discrimination, substance alcohol and sex addictions, violence and bullying, and a variety of mental health issues.
The dialogue, especially is good…..centered around friendships relationships and a young adult community —coming of age—socioeconomic concerns (thank you Capitalism) — communal living — C-PTSD - hardships from being an immigrant - a complex queer love story — all during very turbulent times.
We meet Sneha at an interesting/challenging time in the States….during a recession. As a millennial, Sneha has just graduated college ….. she takes an entry-level corporate job… moves to Milwaukee. Her parents have been deported in India.
And…..
…..Life begins to go haywire — having me think …. it’s much more challenging to face life as a 20-year-old than it does during the earlier teen years.
Sneha makes many mistakes - but she’s also dealing with (not dealing), with childhood trauma.
I liked it…. not over-the-moon swooning over it….but I had a warm heart for Sneha….the issues to contemplate and even the author’s writing style.
The prose feels honest….
with the humor and tender moments balancing the sadness of the conditions of life.
January 2, 2023
When I tell you I was so SO ready to love this book and excited for it…
I’m from Wisconsin, grew up my whole life going into Milwaukee so when I heard about Sarah Thankham Matthews’ book which covers a BIPOC queer woman’s experience living in Milwaukee this book already had my heart and had me at the READY to be it’s biggest cheerleader (also how AMAZING is this cover?!)
Telling the story of Sneha who finds herself uprooted and landing in Milwaukee, fresh from college in an entry level position at a firm with a rotten possible crooked boss, has her first apartment but with a property manager from HELL (and Matthews absolutely NAILS the worst kind of Wisconsin Karens here I gotta say. I know SO many women like this, unfortunately) and struggles with loneliness, trauma and other personal demons. At the heart of the book there’s a beautiful Chosen Family story, there’s a love story, there are family secrets which get revealed And I’d say the first 50% delivered in droves, funny, heartbreaking, messy stuff that anyone who was a mess in their 20’s (AKA all of us) could more than relate to.
But if I’m being honest there were several elements that I found hard to stomach in this book. Early on Sneha makes a bunch of random really cutting remarks about how she doesn’t want to be with a certain character because she’s fat, and wishes she were white. There’s a long rant about how the idea of being Non Binary is ridiculous and while both these thoughts and opinions the author clearly paints in a negative light (in no way do I think that Matthews is endorsing this way of thinking) she also never really does anything with it. It doesn’t contribute to the story or character (other than turn you off even more so from Sneha) Matthews doesn’t ever challenge Sneha or give her any accountability for the really shitty way she occasionally talks or treats her black friend Tig. I also just felt the second half of the book goes on for much longer than it should and what was an exhilarating crackling first half comes to a stand still and loses all momentum and gas in the second. There’s a huge time jump in the final ¼ which made absolutely no sense to me and further disconnected me from caring about the characters.
It’s a bummer because I was genuinely loving this book up to the midpoint and the writing is great and overall I’d say it’s still a strong debut and I’d definitely pick up another book of Matthews but man, did this book let itself down in the latter half.
I’m from Wisconsin, grew up my whole life going into Milwaukee so when I heard about Sarah Thankham Matthews’ book which covers a BIPOC queer woman’s experience living in Milwaukee this book already had my heart and had me at the READY to be it’s biggest cheerleader (also how AMAZING is this cover?!)
Telling the story of Sneha who finds herself uprooted and landing in Milwaukee, fresh from college in an entry level position at a firm with a rotten possible crooked boss, has her first apartment but with a property manager from HELL (and Matthews absolutely NAILS the worst kind of Wisconsin Karens here I gotta say. I know SO many women like this, unfortunately) and struggles with loneliness, trauma and other personal demons. At the heart of the book there’s a beautiful Chosen Family story, there’s a love story, there are family secrets which get revealed And I’d say the first 50% delivered in droves, funny, heartbreaking, messy stuff that anyone who was a mess in their 20’s (AKA all of us) could more than relate to.
But if I’m being honest there were several elements that I found hard to stomach in this book. Early on Sneha makes a bunch of random really cutting remarks about how she doesn’t want to be with a certain character because she’s fat, and wishes she were white. There’s a long rant about how the idea of being Non Binary is ridiculous and while both these thoughts and opinions the author clearly paints in a negative light (in no way do I think that Matthews is endorsing this way of thinking) she also never really does anything with it. It doesn’t contribute to the story or character (other than turn you off even more so from Sneha) Matthews doesn’t ever challenge Sneha or give her any accountability for the really shitty way she occasionally talks or treats her black friend Tig. I also just felt the second half of the book goes on for much longer than it should and what was an exhilarating crackling first half comes to a stand still and loses all momentum and gas in the second. There’s a huge time jump in the final ¼ which made absolutely no sense to me and further disconnected me from caring about the characters.
It’s a bummer because I was genuinely loving this book up to the midpoint and the writing is great and overall I’d say it’s still a strong debut and I’d definitely pick up another book of Matthews but man, did this book let itself down in the latter half.
November 10, 2022
so i could not finish this book. the main character is openly racist? and doesn’t like nonbinary people? and also doesn’t understand communism?
i guess i am very tired of main characters who are so indulgent in their sadness and spend the whole book THINKING instead of actually doing anything.
i have met more than enough 1st gen immigrants who have so much self-hate that it turns into a compulsive obsession with assimilating to whiteness. i’m over it. it’s not interesting, especially when it is not being interrogated at all! and sure, maybe that comes later in the book but i am not subjecting myself to a character who only finds friendship in a fat Black wlw because she “is not her type” and “too brown for her” like wtf? then she chooses to be around wealthy white people from the midwest and then gets upset when they act like wealthy white people from the midwest 😒
ugh i really tried to get into the book because i do like the writing style, even though it was very difficult to figure out who was talking and what was actually being said out loud bc there were no quotation marks (why is that so popular these days???). but yeahhh as someone who is a 1st gen immigrant, what made me get the book was not enough to make me stay.
i guess i am very tired of main characters who are so indulgent in their sadness and spend the whole book THINKING instead of actually doing anything.
i have met more than enough 1st gen immigrants who have so much self-hate that it turns into a compulsive obsession with assimilating to whiteness. i’m over it. it’s not interesting, especially when it is not being interrogated at all! and sure, maybe that comes later in the book but i am not subjecting myself to a character who only finds friendship in a fat Black wlw because she “is not her type” and “too brown for her” like wtf? then she chooses to be around wealthy white people from the midwest and then gets upset when they act like wealthy white people from the midwest 😒
ugh i really tried to get into the book because i do like the writing style, even though it was very difficult to figure out who was talking and what was actually being said out loud bc there were no quotation marks (why is that so popular these days???). but yeahhh as someone who is a 1st gen immigrant, what made me get the book was not enough to make me stay.
October 18, 2022
Hide yo kids and hide yo wives ‘cause Kelly (and the Book Boar) is posting not one but TWO Five Star reviews today! Which leads to the question – what makes a five star read for you? For me the perfect rating is purely a result of my enjoyment. Trashy romances, chick lit, thrillers, highbrow literature can all earn the coveted full monty if I feel a connection. And a connection to an often unlikeable character who I have very little in common with? Well, that’s like spotting a unicorn.
All This Could Be Different features a twenty-two year old unnamed until the second portion of the book main character who has recently graduated from college and relocated to Milwaukee for a job as an entry level project consultant at a Fortune 500 company. This new job affords Sneha the luxury of being able to send money to her parents as well as recruit a fellow college pal into the company. The story follows our lead while she tries to navigate her way through “adulting” for the first time, while also living with constant reminders of her father’s deportation and trauma from her past – both while things are going well and when her newly formed world begins to fall apart.
As I said above, I didn’t have much in common with this group of characters, but boy oh boy did I find myself invested in their lives. This one won’t be for everyone, but if you give it a go I hope you have the same result as me . . .
The meaning of refrain is split. Doubled. To refrain means to stop, to hold yourself back from something, keep yourself in check. But a refrain also points us to repetition. A song’s refrain, constantly returned to. What is the thing that is remembered because it is constantly returned to? think of the ballerina on a child’s jewelry box. The refrains of our lives are the moments we revolve around, maybe the moments that were stopped too soon, stopped before we were ready, and so we are frozen, pirouetting in time, always thinking on the possibility that might have been. If only. If only.
All This Could Be Different features a twenty-two year old unnamed until the second portion of the book main character who has recently graduated from college and relocated to Milwaukee for a job as an entry level project consultant at a Fortune 500 company. This new job affords Sneha the luxury of being able to send money to her parents as well as recruit a fellow college pal into the company. The story follows our lead while she tries to navigate her way through “adulting” for the first time, while also living with constant reminders of her father’s deportation and trauma from her past – both while things are going well and when her newly formed world begins to fall apart.
As I said above, I didn’t have much in common with this group of characters, but boy oh boy did I find myself invested in their lives. This one won’t be for everyone, but if you give it a go I hope you have the same result as me . . .
The meaning of refrain is split. Doubled. To refrain means to stop, to hold yourself back from something, keep yourself in check. But a refrain also points us to repetition. A song’s refrain, constantly returned to. What is the thing that is remembered because it is constantly returned to? think of the ballerina on a child’s jewelry box. The refrains of our lives are the moments we revolve around, maybe the moments that were stopped too soon, stopped before we were ready, and so we are frozen, pirouetting in time, always thinking on the possibility that might have been. If only. If only.
August 11, 2022
I really enjoyed the writing and style of this book. It felt effortless and mixed humor with the pain of life. It’s got a bit of a new adult type vibe and so it’s a little more sweet than I generally care for. The writing is so good though it didn’t bother me as much. Not a lot happens, it’s mostly just relationships that the main character is fostering as she becomes an adult after college.
October 1, 2022
This book has an odd way of placing the white characters on a pedestal and saddling the Black characters with racist tropes (what was the purpose of Tig not being able to read?) The narrator has an obsession with weight and admits that she’s only attracted to thin white girls, and this is never questioned. WHAT? Vaguely troubling politics with an odd conservatism towards alternative lifestyles, led by a protagonist who I wasn’t particularly excited about spending time with.
September 25, 2022
This book just wasn't for me. Shallow and unlikable MC. The bitch, bro and babe comments sounded so ridiculous in the dialogues. Apart from the gorgeous cover by artist Nicole Eisenman, there wasn't much else that I liked about this book.
May 23, 2022
Perfect book. Yummy, yummy prose, and such a valuable entry into the “floundering women in their 20s genre” because it wasn’t afraid to explore the structural issues behind why people in their 20s feel the way we do, it didn’t end with hopelessness, emphasized community, and also wasn’t another white woman protagonist! But I don’t want to compare/pit authors against each other too much. If this were the only book in the world I’d be content, ya know?
August 29, 2022
In All This Could Be Different Sneha takes an entry level consulting position in Milwaukee and feels fortunate to have a job during the recession. She does her work and tries to build a life in this new to her city. She reconnects with a college classmate, Thom, helping him to get hired by her boss. She connects with her friend, Tig, and thinks about her family back home in India including her father who was deported from the US. She also begins to date women. Sneha’s job starts to become volatile, her relationship with Marina constantly ebbing and flowing, both while she has to combat a mean, unreasonable landlord.
My life is quite different from Sneha’s from work, to friends, to romantic interests and location, but I still found many parts of the story relatable — The coming of age as a recent graduate/ newly minted adult, trying to get by and wanting to build a life in a new place. Her behavior was not always likable but I felt for her at times.
I enjoyed All This Could Be Different though I wanted to like it a little more than I did. I felt the earlier part of the story was stronger, however it was easy to read and I definitely wanted to see it through — 3.5 stars
My life is quite different from Sneha’s from work, to friends, to romantic interests and location, but I still found many parts of the story relatable — The coming of age as a recent graduate/ newly minted adult, trying to get by and wanting to build a life in a new place. Her behavior was not always likable but I felt for her at times.
I enjoyed All This Could Be Different though I wanted to like it a little more than I did. I felt the earlier part of the story was stronger, however it was easy to read and I definitely wanted to see it through — 3.5 stars
April 13, 2022
sharp sexy prose. and GAAAAAAAYYY. love that for us
November 2, 2022
grief for the ways their lives had been compost for my own.
I understand the undercurrent of hate and bitterness that underpins sneha's every move; I respect her coming to terms with what it means to be someone who, you suspect, doesn't quite feel emotion in exactly the same way others do. in general, it's great to write an unlikable or difficult-to-like protagonist! it's possible to do that in the way that makes it clear that the character's views are not the same as the writer's! it is 10/10 fuckin weird that the protagonist of this book has an explicitly stated (and repeated!) preference for thin white women (she must date women who are Smaller Than Her! small girlfriend, big jersey voice, small baby bird) that is never narratively challenged or questioned. no fats no mascs no people of color, says the main character. she is shown to experience growth in some arenas; for example, she starts out being pretty heinously cruel about nonbinary people and/or those who chose to use they/them pronouns but by the end at least (I GUESS) ends up in a 'some of my best friends are nonbinary!' place about it. I don't know, I'm not the fuckin morality police but there are just certain choices in this book that were......so weird. why do we like tom. why do we like marina. no fuckin clue bud
April 1, 2022
I loved this book. A first generation/immigrant queer protagonist who is as imperfect, perfectionistic, worried, aimless as so many other millennials I know / love / am. I rooted so hard for Sneha and she's so relatable that I ended up rooting for myself, too. Where I found empathy for her, I found empathy for myself.
Mathews is an inarguably *great* writer. In an almost 400 page book, there were only 1 or 2 times where I lifted an eyebrow at a sentence choice -- and there were MANY times I gasped, paused, re-read, underlined wildly at parts that moved me deeply. I would read her next book without reading the synopsis (just, please, make it queer!!!).
I loved Tig, Sneha's best friend. I loved how messed up, petty, imperfect everyone was. How hard everyone was trying to do well and be well and to be good to one another. This book made me realize trying, failing, and continuing to try, despite your shame and depression and exhaustion, is more valuable than perfection.
A deliberate, patient, hearty, relatable, queer immigrant Midwestern schlep through the protagonist's 20's -- the brokest, hardest, years that force us to become.
I think, and hope, this slice of life book could go very, very far. I am so glad I stumbled into it. I can't wait to handsell it to folks as soon as it comes out.
Mathews is an inarguably *great* writer. In an almost 400 page book, there were only 1 or 2 times where I lifted an eyebrow at a sentence choice -- and there were MANY times I gasped, paused, re-read, underlined wildly at parts that moved me deeply. I would read her next book without reading the synopsis (just, please, make it queer!!!).
I loved Tig, Sneha's best friend. I loved how messed up, petty, imperfect everyone was. How hard everyone was trying to do well and be well and to be good to one another. This book made me realize trying, failing, and continuing to try, despite your shame and depression and exhaustion, is more valuable than perfection.
A deliberate, patient, hearty, relatable, queer immigrant Midwestern schlep through the protagonist's 20's -- the brokest, hardest, years that force us to become.
I think, and hope, this slice of life book could go very, very far. I am so glad I stumbled into it. I can't wait to handsell it to folks as soon as it comes out.
December 1, 2022
This book was a finalist for the National Book Award and several friends raved about it. The best description I’ve seen from people is that it is a quintessentially millennial novel, one that captures the angst of dealing with work, love, friendship, money, and family. Being a bit (ahem) older than a millennial, this book didn’t quite hit me the same way but it’s definitely well-written and powerful.
Sneha moves to Milwaukee for a consulting job shortly after college, at the cusp of the 2008 recession. The job is soul-crushing, but she actually likes some of it. But the job provides her with a free apartment (despite a challenging property manager), a group of colleagues she can at least drink with, and enough money to spend as she wants and still send money home to her parents in India.
All is definitely not perfect, though; she struggles with real connection. Although she is able to get a job for one of her college best friends, and while she finds a close friend, Tig, the dating apps aren’t helping her find a girl to really connect with. Then she meets Marina, a dancer and choreographer with her own set of problems.
Sneha’s life and those of her friends seem built on the flimsiest of foundations. Jobs are in danger, evictions are threatened, addictions are struggled with, and Sneha must come to terms with secrets she has tucked away.
These characters are flawed and complex, and Mathews isn’t afraid to show you their unflattering sides. That doesn’t always make for easy reading; at times characters are racist, transphobic, and fatphobic, but those attitudes are more typical of the time in which the book was set.
If anything, this book may make you happy you survived the stressful days of youth and made it to wherever you are now!!
See all of my reviews at itseithersadnessoreuphoria.blogspot.com.
Follow me on Instagram at https://www.instagram.com/getbookedwithlarry/.
Sneha moves to Milwaukee for a consulting job shortly after college, at the cusp of the 2008 recession. The job is soul-crushing, but she actually likes some of it. But the job provides her with a free apartment (despite a challenging property manager), a group of colleagues she can at least drink with, and enough money to spend as she wants and still send money home to her parents in India.
All is definitely not perfect, though; she struggles with real connection. Although she is able to get a job for one of her college best friends, and while she finds a close friend, Tig, the dating apps aren’t helping her find a girl to really connect with. Then she meets Marina, a dancer and choreographer with her own set of problems.
Sneha’s life and those of her friends seem built on the flimsiest of foundations. Jobs are in danger, evictions are threatened, addictions are struggled with, and Sneha must come to terms with secrets she has tucked away.
These characters are flawed and complex, and Mathews isn’t afraid to show you their unflattering sides. That doesn’t always make for easy reading; at times characters are racist, transphobic, and fatphobic, but those attitudes are more typical of the time in which the book was set.
If anything, this book may make you happy you survived the stressful days of youth and made it to wherever you are now!!
See all of my reviews at itseithersadnessoreuphoria.blogspot.com.
Follow me on Instagram at https://www.instagram.com/getbookedwithlarry/.
January 16, 2024
crushingly good and also made me miss being 23 & flailing in a medium sized midwestern city in the early 2010s
February 25, 2023
3.5ish - I’m not sure yet but I enjoyed!
July 12, 2023
i had high expectations for this one but i guess it was just.. okay.
December 4, 2022
The book started off really well, introducing a complex, if annoying protagonist who’s finding her way through her sexuality, her class, her race, her identity as an immigrant, as a twentysomething. It’s all vividly depicted, especially when it comes to living in the Midwest, and the words have a drive.
But I slowly lost interest as more characters and more issues were introduced only to be left dangling half-fleshed out. By the end, the communal home and the wedding and the what-if romance all just sat there unfinished, waiting for the author to pick one and stick with it fully. I don’t know what the stakes were or what the drive of the story was about because there was so much —too much — to choose from. By the final pages, I didn’t care anymore.
But I slowly lost interest as more characters and more issues were introduced only to be left dangling half-fleshed out. By the end, the communal home and the wedding and the what-if romance all just sat there unfinished, waiting for the author to pick one and stick with it fully. I don’t know what the stakes were or what the drive of the story was about because there was so much —too much — to choose from. By the final pages, I didn’t care anymore.
May 18, 2022
I didn’t anticipate how long it would take me to get through this book. Reading this book felt very vulnerable ( !not nice). I would pick it up, fail to quell the emotions it brought to the fore for me, and then abandon it until I found the courage to pick it up again.
ATCBD is a refreshingly - sometimes painfully - honest book. The prose is sharp and searing and so good. There’s so much compassion and community in this book, all of which seeps into you as you read. It’s real and queer and I will be reading it again and again until I am less afraid of the parts of myself I see in it.
(thank you also to my friend kai for going to great lengths to procure this for me, that too is community!!!)
ATCBD is a refreshingly - sometimes painfully - honest book. The prose is sharp and searing and so good. There’s so much compassion and community in this book, all of which seeps into you as you read. It’s real and queer and I will be reading it again and again until I am less afraid of the parts of myself I see in it.
(thank you also to my friend kai for going to great lengths to procure this for me, that too is community!!!)
May 9, 2023
4.75 stars
Sneha is a recent college graduate who has landed a corporate job in Milwaukee. She is overworked and capable; her boss values the first more than the second. Sneha’s fellow millennials are struggling to find jobs at all, but Sneha’s life is far from charmed: she desperately needs her boss’s sponsorship to gain American citizenship. She’s also lesbian, and though she decides to happily “be a slut”, she’s conflicted about telling her parents she’s queer.
Though Sneha is the flawed, prickly, perceptive and unreliable narrator at its center, her friends, the supportive Tig, the alternately chummy and chilly Thom and the kind Amit, all play an important role in this #ownvoices literary novel. So do her self-involved boss, her racist apartment manager, and her parents, who love her but expect her to enter an arranged marriage with a nice Indian man. Should she come out to them? Share another devastating secret?
The prose here is concise, and as sharp and insightful as Sneha. In 320 short pages Mathews captures what it’s like to be young and just starting to figure out what kind of adult you’re going to be; to be an immigrant and vulnerable to the vicissitudes of your boss; to have a small group of tight-knit friends and friendships that are messy and flawed but nevertheless supportive and well worth hanging on to; to have blind spots, make unfair judgements and unwise choices, expect more openness than you’re comfortable giving, yet be worth caring about. All This Could Be Different brought back my early twenties like no other book has, and I’m so glad I read it.
Sneha is a recent college graduate who has landed a corporate job in Milwaukee. She is overworked and capable; her boss values the first more than the second. Sneha’s fellow millennials are struggling to find jobs at all, but Sneha’s life is far from charmed: she desperately needs her boss’s sponsorship to gain American citizenship. She’s also lesbian, and though she decides to happily “be a slut”, she’s conflicted about telling her parents she’s queer.
Though Sneha is the flawed, prickly, perceptive and unreliable narrator at its center, her friends, the supportive Tig, the alternately chummy and chilly Thom and the kind Amit, all play an important role in this #ownvoices literary novel. So do her self-involved boss, her racist apartment manager, and her parents, who love her but expect her to enter an arranged marriage with a nice Indian man. Should she come out to them? Share another devastating secret?
The prose here is concise, and as sharp and insightful as Sneha. In 320 short pages Mathews captures what it’s like to be young and just starting to figure out what kind of adult you’re going to be; to be an immigrant and vulnerable to the vicissitudes of your boss; to have a small group of tight-knit friends and friendships that are messy and flawed but nevertheless supportive and well worth hanging on to; to have blind spots, make unfair judgements and unwise choices, expect more openness than you’re comfortable giving, yet be worth caring about. All This Could Be Different brought back my early twenties like no other book has, and I’m so glad I read it.
April 26, 2023
Oh, how I loved this debut novel. I came across the author on Twitter or maybe on Lit Hub, read a piece she wrote about writing the book, and felt a surprising connection.
Sneha, daughter of Indian parents, has graduated from college and secured an entry level corporate job in Milwaukee, of all places. The pay is wretched, the hours long, but she has free rent in a company provided apartment.
This young woman is a chronic over-achiever, trying desperately to make her parents proud of her. But she is gay, a secret she cannot reveal to them.
Throughout a dismally cold winter, she makes a few friends, has affairs with women, finds a true love that is fraught with complications.
I think I related so much to the story because I led as wild a life as Sneha did after I left college. Almost everything I did was nothing my parents would approve of. I nearly lost track of who I was. For me it was the late 1960s, early 1970s. For Sheha, the winter and spring of 2012/2013. I was the underachiever, she the overachiever.
It is is the age group that tied us. Those first years of adulthood without a clue.
The writing is astonishing. Assured, propulsive. So much happens every week it seems at that age. One can work, overindulge in substances and sex, barely escape disaster month by month. We think we are invincible though we know we are confused. Sexual energy is high, hopes for a better world are strong.
I would not want to live those years again really, but through Sarah Thankam Mathews, I actually almost did.
Sneha, daughter of Indian parents, has graduated from college and secured an entry level corporate job in Milwaukee, of all places. The pay is wretched, the hours long, but she has free rent in a company provided apartment.
This young woman is a chronic over-achiever, trying desperately to make her parents proud of her. But she is gay, a secret she cannot reveal to them.
Throughout a dismally cold winter, she makes a few friends, has affairs with women, finds a true love that is fraught with complications.
I think I related so much to the story because I led as wild a life as Sneha did after I left college. Almost everything I did was nothing my parents would approve of. I nearly lost track of who I was. For me it was the late 1960s, early 1970s. For Sheha, the winter and spring of 2012/2013. I was the underachiever, she the overachiever.
It is is the age group that tied us. Those first years of adulthood without a clue.
The writing is astonishing. Assured, propulsive. So much happens every week it seems at that age. One can work, overindulge in substances and sex, barely escape disaster month by month. We think we are invincible though we know we are confused. Sexual energy is high, hopes for a better world are strong.
I would not want to live those years again really, but through Sarah Thankam Mathews, I actually almost did.
September 1, 2022
This book made me feel A LOT. Especially the end portion, I felt as though once we got past part one we were on a roller coaster, and we reached the top by the last page. I needed to take time to process everything about this one, because so much was covered. I think this book suffers from being too short. I think with 100 more pages we could have seen more developed relationships between the characters, which would help with the framing of Tig's great idea. I think this is a well-written book, I could not put it down. I fell in love with Tig, and I feel as though I truly got to know each of the characters, even the parts about them that I didn't like. I question the main character's politics. I don't think she's supposed to be inherently likable, but I feel as though she thinks poorly about some things and never comes back to them, and I wish she had more of a sense of introspection. There are some questions I have about decisions the author made, not that I'm upset, I just want to know more about why they were made. Overall I would read this, it's an amazing debut with a stunning cover, I know I will think about it frequently.
August 16, 2023
the theme this year in my reading is apparently sad sapphics and to that i say game on
October 12, 2023
3.5 stars
The beautiful, messy, queer, love letter to my hometown that I never knew I needed. I had some quibbles about this book for sure, but I'm honestly willing to forgive a lot because of what this book did for the city of Milwaukee.
So for context, I was born and raised in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, and I've never seen my hometown represented in a book this way before! (I usually wouldn't be this open on the internet, but I don't live there anymore, and it's kinda crucial to my review.) Not only does this book take place in Milwaukee, it actively shouts out so many iconic locations that were immediately recognizable to me. I'm sure many other books do this for all the major cities, but something about reading a book with this much intimate knowledge about the place I grew up is just so cathartic and validating. She even quotes an iconic midwestern poet, Danez Smith at the end:
I keep trying to separate out my more subjective feelings about this story and imagine if I would feel the same way about it if it took place somewhere else. But even for other readers, I love that they're being introduced to Milwaukee and all its weird charms. Regardless of where, the sense of "place" in this book is an incredibly important part of it.
Milwaukee is notoriously underappreciated outside the Midwest, and at the same time, for the past several decades, it's really been beaten down by the rest of Wisconsin in the state government. It's a Great Migration city, which means it's the nucleus of the Black and Brown population in an otherwise very white, very conservative state. It's also the only mid-sized city in the state, so naturally it has the highest crime rate by default. As a result of both these factors (*cough* racism), it's weirdly both feared and touted by the rest of the state. And of course, it's one of the most segregated cities in the country. All these factors make it a complicated and unique city to write about.
As others have pointed out, this book focuses a lot on community, which to me was one of its biggest strengths. Milwaukee has a lot of issues, but one of the things I miss most is its sense of community. People often call it a "big city with a small town vibe," and people are just more friendly and welcoming there. Community organizing in particular is very strong, and I loved Thankam Matthew's representation of that, particularly memorializing Dontre Hamilton, who was murdered by the Milwaukee police in 2014.
I do think that in some ways, this book suffers from Thankam Mathews's own experience in Milwaukee, which I assume was similar to Sneha's. She definitely touches on a lot of the deeper issues surrounding race and class in Milwaukee, but Sneha's perspective is still that of a young adult transplant who lives in a nicer, gentrified neighborhood. As much as I enjoyed seeing my hometown represented and appreciated, it still is a different version of Milwaukee than someone who grew up in the city would have.
In general, the politics of this book are... messy, to say the least.The story seems to be semi-autobiographical, and in some ways I can appreciate the rawness and realness of Sneha's character development. She definitely says some pretty wild stuff, but she does show growth, and I appreciate that.
Still, Sneha is deeply unlikable as a main character. I read a lot of high fantasy so I can handle an unlikable protagonist, but sometimes Sneha's thoughts and actions gave me such deep second-hand embarrassment that it was actually hard to read. I'm not trying to be holier-than-thou, and I think I understand the goal of making Sneha real and imperfect... but girl, I did not need to hear every single intrusive thought you have. Sometimes internal monologue can stay concealed.
Sneha's relationships with her friends are also pretty weird, and she really is not a great friend to them. I've already gone on a lot in this review (and I'm white so there's that), so I'll leave the critiques on the racial politics to others, but there's definitely some questionable choices made there.
On the plus side, though, I really enjoyed the discussions of mental health and childhood trauma. The depiction of depression in this book is also deeply uncomfortable, but in a way, it absolutely needs to be. That does mean that there's some hefty trigger warnings I'm putting on this book, but if you can handle it, it's absolutely worth the read for that alone.
Also it's very queer and has multiple non-binary characters. So that's always a plus. There's also some great reflection on diaspora and family and belonging, and it was all just lovely.
So I don't know how to feel about this book. There was a period near the middle where I was not enjoying myself and came pretty close to DNFing it, but when I finished the book, I was just left with this warm, satisfied feeling. Again, I don't know how much of my opinions were influenced simply by this taking place in Milwaukee, but I really loved that aspect of it, even if I have critiques.
Would I recommend it? I have no idea. If it seems like the things I mentioned will bother you, maybe skip it. But I think for the most part, the discomfort is worth it. This story made me think, made me question what I believe, and it made me feel seen. What more could I ask for than that?
Content Warnings: childhood SA, incest, CPTSD, scene of mild(?) police abuse, memories of parental neglect, deportation, deep depression, transphobia (challenged), fatphobia (kind of challenged?), gross capitalist bosses and landlords
Happy to answer questions about any of this, it's a lot
The beautiful, messy, queer, love letter to my hometown that I never knew I needed. I had some quibbles about this book for sure, but I'm honestly willing to forgive a lot because of what this book did for the city of Milwaukee.
So for context, I was born and raised in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, and I've never seen my hometown represented in a book this way before! (I usually wouldn't be this open on the internet, but I don't live there anymore, and it's kinda crucial to my review.) Not only does this book take place in Milwaukee, it actively shouts out so many iconic locations that were immediately recognizable to me. I'm sure many other books do this for all the major cities, but something about reading a book with this much intimate knowledge about the place I grew up is just so cathartic and validating. She even quotes an iconic midwestern poet, Danez Smith at the end:
"at the end of the world, let there be you, my world."
I keep trying to separate out my more subjective feelings about this story and imagine if I would feel the same way about it if it took place somewhere else. But even for other readers, I love that they're being introduced to Milwaukee and all its weird charms. Regardless of where, the sense of "place" in this book is an incredibly important part of it.
"Don't you ever, ever, ever become one of those people... calling all this flyover country. Thinking we're just about beer and cheese and serial killers and corn. Things happen here. Happened here."
Milwaukee is notoriously underappreciated outside the Midwest, and at the same time, for the past several decades, it's really been beaten down by the rest of Wisconsin in the state government. It's a Great Migration city, which means it's the nucleus of the Black and Brown population in an otherwise very white, very conservative state. It's also the only mid-sized city in the state, so naturally it has the highest crime rate by default. As a result of both these factors (*cough* racism), it's weirdly both feared and touted by the rest of the state. And of course, it's one of the most segregated cities in the country. All these factors make it a complicated and unique city to write about.
"How was anyone expected to dream loftily about the future when the present ground them into nothingness?"
As others have pointed out, this book focuses a lot on community, which to me was one of its biggest strengths. Milwaukee has a lot of issues, but one of the things I miss most is its sense of community. People often call it a "big city with a small town vibe," and people are just more friendly and welcoming there. Community organizing in particular is very strong, and I loved Thankam Matthew's representation of that, particularly memorializing Dontre Hamilton, who was murdered by the Milwaukee police in 2014.
I do think that in some ways, this book suffers from Thankam Mathews's own experience in Milwaukee, which I assume was similar to Sneha's. She definitely touches on a lot of the deeper issues surrounding race and class in Milwaukee, but Sneha's perspective is still that of a young adult transplant who lives in a nicer, gentrified neighborhood. As much as I enjoyed seeing my hometown represented and appreciated, it still is a different version of Milwaukee than someone who grew up in the city would have.
In general, the politics of this book are... messy, to say the least.The story seems to be semi-autobiographical, and in some ways I can appreciate the rawness and realness of Sneha's character development. She definitely says some pretty wild stuff, but she does show growth, and I appreciate that.
Still, Sneha is deeply unlikable as a main character. I read a lot of high fantasy so I can handle an unlikable protagonist, but sometimes Sneha's thoughts and actions gave me such deep second-hand embarrassment that it was actually hard to read. I'm not trying to be holier-than-thou, and I think I understand the goal of making Sneha real and imperfect... but girl, I did not need to hear every single intrusive thought you have. Sometimes internal monologue can stay concealed.
Sneha's relationships with her friends are also pretty weird, and she really is not a great friend to them. I've already gone on a lot in this review (and I'm white so there's that), so I'll leave the critiques on the racial politics to others, but there's definitely some questionable choices made there.
On the plus side, though, I really enjoyed the discussions of mental health and childhood trauma. The depiction of depression in this book is also deeply uncomfortable, but in a way, it absolutely needs to be. That does mean that there's some hefty trigger warnings I'm putting on this book, but if you can handle it, it's absolutely worth the read for that alone.
"Nobody ever felt only one thing at a time."
Also it's very queer and has multiple non-binary characters. So that's always a plus. There's also some great reflection on diaspora and family and belonging, and it was all just lovely.
So I don't know how to feel about this book. There was a period near the middle where I was not enjoying myself and came pretty close to DNFing it, but when I finished the book, I was just left with this warm, satisfied feeling. Again, I don't know how much of my opinions were influenced simply by this taking place in Milwaukee, but I really loved that aspect of it, even if I have critiques.
Would I recommend it? I have no idea. If it seems like the things I mentioned will bother you, maybe skip it. But I think for the most part, the discomfort is worth it. This story made me think, made me question what I believe, and it made me feel seen. What more could I ask for than that?
Content Warnings: childhood SA, incest, CPTSD, scene of mild(?) police abuse, memories of parental neglect, deportation, deep depression, transphobia (challenged), fatphobia (kind of challenged?), gross capitalist bosses and landlords
Happy to answer questions about any of this, it's a lot
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