I have always been intrigued by Broder's books, and I even own a copy of The Pisces that I just haven't gotten around to yet, so I'm very glad I've finally read one of her works! I always like the premises of her books, of these average women dealing with life through bouts of surrealism as almost coping mechanisms to guide them through, and Broder's take on grief coming out through her mystical experiences in the desert, contrasted with the banality of the motel she resides in and her unfulfilling relationship with her husband at home was truly a great reading experience in Death Valley. The narrative voice of this unnamed protagonist felt so strong and relatable, that although she's clearly going through a terrible time in her personal life and coping in unbelievable ways, she also felt so understandable, and I have been thinking of her since I finished it.

Maintaining family relationships is hard work. Surviving in the desert is harder – but only just. This surrealist, darkly funny novel sets the mental challenge of grief against the sun-bleached, water-parched landscape of California’s Death Valley, the hottest place on earth. Our unnamed narrator, a forty-something-year-old writer, is struggling. Her husband is chronically unwell with a flu-like illness that has completely taken over his life, and five months ago her father was critically injured in a car accident in Los Angeles – he now lies in intensive care, leaving the narrator and her family stranded between worlds. Her father occasionally wakes for brief periods of time, only to fall back into unconsciousness, and the most recent round of these events have seen her run to the desert to escape the cycle and try to work on her stalled novel. She checks into a Best Western hotel just south of Death Valley, desperate to make progress on the book – and by extension, on herself.

After arriving she almost immediately receives a text from her mother: her father is awake again, but she should not come back. Our narrator calls to find out more about her father’s health, but her mother swiftly moves the conversation on to the apparent necessity of returning multiple pairs of sweatpants, and bats away any attempts to connect on a deeper, more emotional level – her mother is handling the crisis by staying busy and focusing on logistics, while our narrator, bewildered by her mother’s obsession with minutiae, is completely paralysed by the ebb and flow of her emotions. Who’s dealing with the situation better? What does it actually mean to handle something well?

Stricken by guilt for not being at her father’s bedside, consumed by self-loathing for finding her husband’s illness annoying, the narrator takes a suggestion from the hotel receptionist and goes for a hike in the desert. On the drive to the trailhead she listens to audiobooks about grief suggested by the r/deathanddying subreddit, which has told her that grieving her father before he’s actually passed away is by no means weird – and she wonders about looking for signs from her father, something to show her the way.

She starts off on the trail while texting her mother, who has messaged to say the sweatpants have finally been returned, and that she should be sure to take water on her hike. She hasn’t, but she lies about it to her mother, and doesn’t know why she does this. Annoyance makes her put her phone away, determined to connect with the experience of the natural world more fully – which is when she first spots the improbably enormous cactus that will become the scene of her unravelling, and her awakening.

This is a hugely moving book which asks questions about the everyday and the exceptional, and the way in which life is both at once: it is amazing that we are here at all, and yet losing someone important still feels like an otherworldly, impossible experience. We might feel in control of events – and yet all it takes to completely up-end our existence is a moment in which we miss a turning, stumble off the trail, and slip into another reality.

Featured in the October issue of Cambridge Edition magazine, print and online

My first read of Broder and I thought this was really great. Death Valley was a perfect blend of cynical and woo woo, both profound and hilarious.

Our narrator goes to a Best Western in the desert. She needs space from her Dad in the ICU, her chronically ill husband and her neurotic mother to work on her novel. (As an aside, the narrator’s love of Best Westerns had me cackling). While there, she finds a hollow cactus and climbs inside. She sees visions. She goes back the next day and…. Gets lost. Girlie! Why did you go to the desert without telling anyone! The desert makes her a bit loopy but this is where the real insight happens.

I read this not long after finishing Richard Brautigan’s Trout Fishing in America and would really recommend both together. Both works raise interesting questions about our connection with nature, the meaning of life, productivity as value etc.

TLDR; it’s magic, it’s a cactus

Thank you to NetGalley and the publishers for an ARC in exchange for my honest review.

I read this because I wanted to try Melissa Broder and I liked the premise, but Death Valley was just not my kind of thing at all! Should have guessed given that Melissa Broder writes weird magical realism fiction but oh well...

I'm a huge Melissa Broder fan and this book is very different to what I've read from her before. I was a bit confused when I finished the book - I'm used to her wonderfully weird stories, but this one fell a tiny bit flat for me. I read an article afterwards which explained how the story is based on real events in Melissa's life and it suddenly made more sense!

I enjoyed the unnamed narrator a lot and thought she was a great character. I loved being inside her head. There were lots of different strands going on in this little book and I'm not sure they all came together in the end for me. I enjoy surrealist books but I didn't quite 'get' this one. Still enjoyable though!

3.75 stars

My thanks to the publisher and Netgalley for my free digital ARC!

I'm a fan of Broder's work, and Death Valley is another surreal offering to her repertoire. This one draws a *lot* from Broder's own experience. The main character is an author who is a long-term caregiver for her husband, whose father has just suffered a terrible car accident and is in ICU. All of these things are true for Broder as well, and it's clear from the book that writing this was an incredibly cathartic experience for her.

However, I did see another reviewer (I'm sorry, I forget who!!) point out that this whole book is the MC/author grappling with how *they* feel about their caregiver roles, which sort of makes the people she's caring for seem like a burden. I have no experience being a caregiver but I'm 100% sure it is difficult, but something about this just kept niggling at me the whole way through. Like on the one hand she is entitled to her thoughts and her mental health is valid, but also it came off a touch... selfish?

That being said, it's a compulsive and unique read for sure. Long story short - woman checks into a Best Western for a mental health break, ends up climbing inside a cactus and getting lost in the desert. Lots of reflections and epiphanies along the way, with a nice little dose of humour.

Overall, I would recommend it if you like your storytelling a little surreal and a lot meta!

3.5

Melissa Broder is one of my favourite authors and I will always look for and read her books.

This wasn't my favourite Broder novel but was pleased to be back in a weird/uncomfortable/fascinating story she creates

Read this and it was a bit weird for my liking. A challenging story with themes and characters that were hard to stomach at times. This is going to have a very specific audience.

What a fantastically strange and wonderful book this is!

Broder's prose is just beautiful, and completely draws you in. And whilst our nameless protagonist was undoubtedly frustrating, I felt so much empathy towards her.

It's a witty and wise novel, and is simultaneously heartbreaking, thought-provoking, and humorous.

Melissa Broder is just a genius!

Women's Prize longlisted author Melissa Broder returns with another book full of self-effacing wit.

Death Valley follows an unnamed writer in crisis - her father is in the ICU and close to death, while her husband is permanently ill. She escapes to a best Western near the desert to finish her book but goes on hikes instead of writing,ending up lost in the desert in what becomes an increasingly surreal journey. While it's not hugely plot-driven -its the woman's meditations on her life and relationships - it's engagingly written, moving and funny, covering love. loss, sex and grief to great success.

This turned out to be totally unexpected and unlike anything else I've read. It was quite a journey - funny, trippy, sad and wise in turns.

We follow an unnamed protagonist, a woman novelist whose father is in the ICU and whose husband is chronically ill. She escapes to the desert to figure out how to write her next novel and in doing so, treads the line between fantasy and reality, meditating on grief and family and the trauma of mourning those who are still alive. This makes it sound far more morbid than it is. Border is funny and engaging and this is surreal but brilliant. I loved it for its strangeness and heart.

death valley follows an unnamed narrator, a novelist in her forties who is simultaneously trying to cope with her father’s current hospitalisation in the ICU and her husband’s ongoing illness. needing some time alone and seeking inspiration to finish her novel, she checks into a hotel in death valley, embarking on the nearby hiking trails where she finds a towering cactus which seems to have some mystical properties.

i’m not usually one for magical realism/fantasy, but the way the fantastical elements (the cactus portal, the main character having conversations with inanimate objects and her father as a child etc.) were used as a vehicle for the protagonist to explore and process her grief is something i can appreciate. the protagonist’s foray into the desert allows for an exploration of grief, love and loss, death, family, existential dread, father-daughter relationships, empathy and compassion, survival, and of what it means to love someone who is dying. despite these rather existential themes, the novel is still a fast, easy read due to the companionable, witty voice of the narrator, whose humour offers a touch of lightness.

This was my first Melissa Broder's novel - I heard many good things about her and I loved the premise of Death Valley. The blurb made me think of Carlos Castaneda but that was over quickly! I found it very easy to read. Our protagonist was in equal parts funny and annoying. It got surreal very soon, and I liked the way the real and fantastical parts were intertwined. The crescendo of the story was of course once our (nameless) main character gets utterly lost in the desert. There was some excellent writing there - desperate, humorous and infuriating, and that was probably the best part of the novel. I struggled a little with the last section of the book, and the whole sub-plot about the father felt very disjointed and underwhelming. On the other side I would have liked to have more of the husband in the story.

The ending was sweet. Overall this was an entertaining little gem, with plenty of amusing passages, and a very distinct tone.

This book was a mixed bag for me. I've previously really enjoyed Melissa Broder's Milk Fed, and thought it was so well written, and darkly humourous, so I was excited to pick this book up. And while the same writing is still in this book, it falls down for me when it comes to characters. I find it very hard to get behind characters who continually make ridiculous decisions for seeminly no reason.

While I still liked the writing, and the humour of the main charcters inner musings, I couldn't feel emotionally connected to her. The book also felt too on to nose meta to me by the end, about the struggle of the author character trying to finish a novel about the desert. It just didn't quite work for me.

2.5 stars, I still enjoyed the writing but something was really lacking here for me. I will defintely still be checking out Melissa Broder's other work though.

Death Valley, a darkly funny, surreal rumination on grief, chronic illness and the complicated relationships we have with our parents as adults, is my first exposure to Melissa Broder's unique voice, and I have immediately added her previous work to my want-to-read list.

Our unnamed protagonist and narrator checks into a Best Western in the California high desert in order to work on her latest novel - progress having stalled thanks to her husband's ongoing struggle with a mystery illness, her father's long hospitalisation after a serious car accident, and her own mental health. Upon arrival, she decides to explore a local trail, and stumbles upon a giant cactus which definitely has no business being in California.

From this point on the novel, which starts off normally enough, takes a swift turn into magical realism, and the reader finds themselves questioning whether or not we can trust anything in the narrative thereafter, as the plausible mingles effortlessly with the utterly absurd.

Broder's protagonist is a knowing, clever take on the autofiction genre - the author is herself a carer for her husband, who suffers from a chronic illness, and the protagonist is an author too. Much of the candid, uncomfortable reflection on what it is like to care for someone with a long term illness likely draws from Broder's own experience; the part where the main character climbs inside a magical cactus, where a childish version of her father is building a sandcastle, is presumably not.

As the protagonist wanders the desert, increasingly lost and disoriented, she wrestles with what it means to inhabit the liminal space of chronic illness and long term recovery from an accident, both with no obvious end point. Although the second half of the novel brings it into the survival story genre, the main character's journey is just as much about processing her grief and evaluating her relationships with her husband and father as it is about finding her way out of the desert.

In unashamedly meta moments, the main character ponders what the plot of the novel she is working on should be: she notes that some kind of character transformation is necessary for a successful novel, and that 'Whatever it is that needs to go down in “the desert section” could have something to do with the cactus.'

Broder's wry, languid way of describing events, people and places brings an unusually humorous tone to the survival story; I laughed out loud when the protagonist thinks she is hearing the voice of Satan in the desert, only to realise that she has inadvertently started her audiobook playing at 0.5x speed. The character's debilitating self-awareness only adds to the bleak comedy.

Thank you to NetGalley and Bloomsbury Publishing Plc for the opportunity to read and review an ARC of this book.

4.25 🌟
Death Valley was a book I had been eagerly anticipating for most of 2023, and it turned out to be a pleasant surprise. Initially I might have hoped for a narrative akin to "Milk Fed" or "The Pisces., however, "Death Valley" took me on a wholly different journey that left a lasting impression. I think it showcases Melissa Broders range and makes me even more excited to see where her career will take her.
The story, though initially not at all what I anticipated, grew on me as I read on. It exuded a magical, surreal, and dreamy quality, making it, in my opinion, Melissa Broder's most personal work. The narrator's struggle to grapple with her father and husband's illnesses was both poignant and heartbreaking. The hazy and disorienting desert landscape served as a unique backdrop for this journey. In the end, it was a narrative about survival, love, and the inevitable embrace of death.
The desert setting in itself is symbolic - not much thrives in the desert unless one can learn to adapt. When you fight for your life, your mind processes a multitude of thoughts in a short span, offering a fresh perspective on existence. "Death Valley" felt like a fever dream, and as I reached the end, I found myself fully immersed in the narrative. In fact, I was tempted to re-read it immediately, knowing that there would be more to uncover with each subsequent reading.
This book, while distinctly different from her previous works, retains Broder's signature cadence, dark humour, and wit. It carries forward the same qualities I love in her writing but stands as a unique and one-of-a-kind story, and I hope readers embrace it for its originality rather than feeling disappointed that her style is changing.

Melissa Broder’s novel is a deliberate parody of autofiction which gradually morphs into realms of the fantastical and surreal. Broder’s narrator shares many of Broder’s characteristics: a novelist; a carer for a husband with a chronic illness; sober for many years; and now grappling with the possibility that her father could be dying. The narrator’s father is in an ICU in LA, after a long vigil she’s made aware her physical presence is no longer needed, so now she’s in a desert town close to Death Valley, officially there to work on her latest book. The narrator’s account is laced with wry humour which mirrors Broder’s own father’s love of sarcasm. For much of the time the narrator is alone, her primary contact with other people consists of texts and video calls, in part a nod to the Covid, lockdown era in which this was conceived.

The narrator checks into a Best Western motel, a place where Broder once meditated while attempting to write an earlier piece of fiction, but also somewhere that serves as a metaphor for aspects of contemporary American culture - with its rich vein of the mass-produced substituting for the authentic. Broder was once dubbed the high priestess of depression and her narrator reflects that title, overwhelmed by intense anxiety and seemingly intractable existential dilemmas, which she explores through Reddit and various forms of superficial spiritual mantras. Through happenstance, and an encounter with a giant, mystical cactus, the narrator is lost in the desert. Isolated and injured, she’s left with her feelings of anticipatory grief, questions about mortality, and desperate longing for some higher meaning.

Broder consciously draws on a range of influences from Thomas Bernhard to Edward Abbey but, for me, this often read like a partial send-up of Cheryl Strayed’s Wild with its notion of being lost and then found in nature. Although Broder also seems conflicted, both attracted and repelled by a very similar philosophy, as her narrator’s time in the wilderness forces her to confront her innermost fears and bewildering, personal narratives. In that sense Broder’s novel can seem overshadowed by the kind of quick fix, self-help, pseudo-philosophy I associate, rightly or wrongly, with a certain brand of LA-based creativity. Something I found fascinating mostly because it’s so totally alien to my own experience or ways of thinking. But, despite my rising scepticism, I found the narrator’s situation curiously relatable and often deeply moving, her inner struggles suggesting her story’s not so much a question of finding solace in the readymade or the superficial but a desperate search for tools to deal with loss and with emotional turmoil that would threaten to sink anyone.

No one is writing the way Melissa Broder is. She has a voice that is simultaneously warm, wild, and weird.

Our protagonist’s is dealing with familial issues and grief, so she takes off to the California desert to work through things. While on a hike she climbs inside a giant cactus. Everything kind of goes crazy from there.

It's a really intriguing concept, with grief looked at through a pseudo-magical lens.
I enjoyed it, but it took me a while to get through just because I was struggling to grasp the writing and I couldn't help but feel the characters let the novel down.
Interesting, great at parts but not my favourite.

Thanks to Netgalley and Bloomsbury for the ARC.

⭐ ⭐ ⭐ ⭐
Death Valley
by Melissa Broder

What's the fastest way to pull you into a story? For me it's narrative voice. Beautiful writing makes itself evident quickly, a pacy plot may begin with a compelling hook, amazing characters take time to build, but a great voice is instant, I'll follow it anywhere.

Our unnamed narrator seeks a bit of tranquil respite from her overwhelming life in the Californian desert. She just needs a little time out and turns to Best Western for their dependable comfort without fuss. She discovers a unique cocoon situation in a surprising place, and I don't want to infer magical realism or fantasy, but things take an unusual turn when she finds herself lost in the desert, dehydrated, hallucinating and anthromorphising animals and minerals.

As she compounds her crises she brings us on her journey of discovery, through her marriage's strain due to her husband's debilitating illness, her father's near death and subsequent ICU stay, her relationship with her mother and her failure to launch her writing career while her writing friends one by one succumb to non creative careers.

It is side splitting funny, but packed with sad truths about how our lives can veer out of control and how we anticipate and react to trauma and grief. It is warm and relatable and a bit woo-woo while trying hard not to be. You just have to go with it, put it down to the heat of the desert sun and the state of mind of a woman at the end of her tether.

I loved every minute of this quirky, slightly surreal tale and felt a huge rush of compassion for the author when I later read that this is loosely based on her real life lost-in-the-desert experience and the death of her father.

Another author who's writing I need to explore more of.

Publication date: 24th October 2023
Thanks to #NetGalley and #bloomsburyuk for the eGalley

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