An interesting read that ultimately puts a highlight on the bias perceived or otherwise in industries such as publishing through a decidedly humorous lens when it doesn't go to plan. Not really my kind of novel genre wise, but still a captivating read...and would say it sits in the genre carved out by the likes of Kuang's YellowFace.

Thank you for the ARC...

Relebogile Naledi Mpho Moruakgomo writes a red-hot play that can’t make it out of the rejection pile. Naledi assumes her non-white sounding name might be the reason. Fate sends her Hugo Lawrence Smith, an unfulfilled law student on the wrong career path. Relaunching Naledi’s play under Hugo’s beiger name, the London Theatre scene responds with offers, gushes of praise and honours. Naledi and Hugo have set their sights on exposing the innate racism and bias of the arts world, but there’s something even more rotten at work and their plan veers in another direction.

Naledi’s character confused me at first. I couldn’t fathom how a creator could give up her ‘baby’ to a stranger and continue with the ruse long after it had served its purpose. It is this frustration with Eddie’s self-deprecating, unlucky-in-love, unlucky-in-work character that kicked me onto the right path. Her humanity has been amped up to mythic level and those never end well. But they do make for quite a tale. Hugo was the typical privileged nepo winner of our times, born into privilege and loth to let it go.

Warona Jay writes with the intuition of a seasoned storyteller. She writes with wit and humour and casts a dry eye on relationships. Her characters are deep and unpredictable. The story of starving for your art is rendered in a very beguiling way. This is a story of relinquishing your rights to something because you love it and a very important message for the century. If you liked Meg Wolitzer’s ‘The Wife’ or ‘Queenie’ by Candice Carty-Williams, this will be a fun read. Warona Jay has shown she’s got the writing chops and I will be on the lookout for her next title.
Thanks to NetGalleyUK and Footnote for the eARC.

Loved this. Loved how the author really examined racism and feminism through the main characters of this book. Also loved the power plays and the dynamic shifts between the two main characters as the fame rises. Really enjoyed this one!

This is such a complex and thoughtful story. The heavy discussions of race and privilege are nothing new; but the characters who are voicing them are flawed and confused.
I empathised with both Eddie’s frustration at the system and Hugo’s desire to do good. The friendship the grew between them was one of my favourite elements of this: two people who wouldn’t necessarily become friends.
I can’t really put into words how surprising this book was. It was very readable (even with the unusual second person perspective addressing the other main character) and moments that left aghast, while being kept in the realm of reality.
4.25 ⭐️

Thank you to NetGalley and the publishers for the digital ARC in advance for an honest review

I really loved the premise for this book and was excited to read it. It wasted no time getting to the hook, and I was intrigued from very early on to find out what happened with Eddie's idea to have her play go out into the world under Hugo's name. I did find that the plot meandered a bit throughout the second and third acts of the book. I wasn't all that invested in Hugo and yet we spent a lot of time in his head and looking at his relationships and his internal dialogue. I just wasn't as interested in him as I was in Eddie - I wanted to see how her scheme affected her personally, and ultimately what would happen if/when the truth was revealed and that hopefully she would get some form of justice. Subsequently, it felt like it took a while to get to the ending, and it felt slightly rushed. I just wish we could have spent more time with Eddie than with Hugo, as the book ended up feeling more like his story than hers (an irony, considering).

This book talks about privileges and what people with real talents often get shoved aside because they don't fit the majority's standard. So imagine what happens when this piece of art is being published under a different name? Will it bring the story to light?
I found myself enjoying this more than I initially thought I would. I also love the ending. It's very entertaining.

This was a very interesting book, filled with a great look on racism within the arts. Thought-provoking and infuriating in parts.
Thank you to the publisher and NetGalley for the chance to read this ARC.

Keenly Observed..
A peek behind the closed and closeted world of publishing in this insightful and thought provoking tale of artists trying to pursue their dreams. As plans are hatched and put into motion, things are about to get very complicated indeed. Pacy and engaging with a cast of deftly drawn characters, empathetic and human, and very keenly observed.

Clever and thoughtful with engaging characters - you can’t help but love Eddie but you won’t agree with all her decisions. A very human novel about privilege, choices and responsibility. Readable and engaging twists and turns.

Thanks to NetGalley and the publisher for this ARC.

This is another novel in the vein of Erasure and Yellowface that aims to expose the prejudices behind our 'objective' art forms - Jay here turns her attention towards the theatre world. Unfortunately it doesn't quite stand up to the heights of Yellowface - I found the prose quite stilted in places and there were some particularly frustrating 'why can't those two characters just TALK to each other' moments. However, the inherent racism in UK theatre was well-explored and it's definitely a topic that needs addressing.

Thank you for granting me early access to this gorgeous book.
Relegobile Naledi Mpho Moruakgomo—‘Eddie’ to friends—is a fierce, sharp-witted playwright who graduates top of her class with a script so brilliant it practically glows. But there’s a catch: no one in the industry wants to touch it. After trying everything, including a not-so-subtle name change, Eddie finds the door still slammed shut because, surprise, her foot—Black, female, and determined—isn't what they’re looking for. Enter Hugo Lawrence Smith, a trust-fund kid with about as much interest in law as a fish has in hiking. Bored of life in court, he wants the thrill of the theatre and isn’t above using his privilege to get it. Together, they hatch a deliciously risky plan: Hugo will play frontman to Eddie's genius, and when their play inevitably dazzles, they’ll pull back the curtain on the industry’s rampant racism and hypocrisy. Simple, right?

What unfolds, though, is anything but predictable. I started this expecting a familiar tune, something close to Yellowface by R. F. Kuang, but this story went above and beyond. It’s witty, furious, smart, and stuffed with sharp twists that kept me guessing and laughing. Jay’s writing feels alive, and this was a joyride of a read from start to finish.

The basis for this book is a good idea, though unfortunately its not so well told, and it doesn't have enough originality to keep me reading.

The Grand Scheme of Things offers such a promising premise, but unfortunately falls short in its execution to me. The beginning was great - I loved Eddie's POV of her showing us her struggles and her frustration at the racism she experienced of trying to get her play published - but then it just goes downwards from there. I felt that the focus on 'exposing racism in theater,' which to me was the whole point of this book, got overshadowed by Eddie and Hugo's personal conflicts and drama, and dilutes the core message of this book even until the end.

A very different but gripping story. The characters were fab. I enjoyed the way it went.

Thank you to the author, publishers and netgalley for an e-arc in exchange for an honest review.

DNF. I struggled with this one and I think it was due to the tense through which the author opted to tell the story. It's original, you can certainly give it that, and I was really interested in the subject. But the novel has a second tense approach to the narrative and I felt it just moved a bit too slowly for my taste - even for literary fiction. This is a book that I might come back to in the future (I'd like to read a few other reviews of this book and see whether it's worth continuing on for), but it's just not for me right now.

This books begs to ask: if you lie, how far will you take it? Are you ready to face everything that comes (or doesn’t) with it?
The writing mostly flows well and the plot kept me engaged. I mostly felt that the characters had depth and weren’t flat or one dimensional. I also really liked how the author chose to share the story from Eddie and Hugo’s POV.
If you’ve read and loved Yellowface, you might enjoy this as the theme is similar. I, personally, didn’t enjoy Yellowface as much as I enjoyed this— crazy, I know!
Thank you for the free ARC!

Highly enjoyable novel about Naledi/Eddie, a Black British playwright trying to get her big break, but not getting any luck. Things change when she meets posh and suave Hugo in a coffee shop and they come up with a clever plan to get Naledi's play onto the stage and expose the theatre world's racism.
I wasn't sure about this initially, but it ended up being a clever and enjoyable novel. I thought the end - no spoilers, but when a character gets romantically involved with another - a bit less interesting, but it was well written, sarcastic and intelligent.

Free ARC sent by Netgalley.

I was sent an advance proof copy of The Grand Scheme of Things by Warona Jay to read and review by NetGalley. This novel highlights a lot of issues in the theatre, film and publishing world regarding women and especially women of colour. These issues can easily be transferred to many, if not most occupations. At times I felt that things were getting a little too worthy, as if the reader hadn’t actually taken in the intrinsic point of the book. That aside, this is a well-structured and well written novel with quite vivid characters and a good level of description. I can’t say I particularly warmed to any of the characters as such but was very interested in what they had to say. A quite enlightening and important book.

The premise of this book grabbed me but I feel like it was a little flat towards the end for me.

From the beginning I was hooked. I couldn’t wait to see the deception and lies unravel and how they would deal with the fault out of their decisions.

The writing style was easy and hooked me. I felt like I knew what was going on.

I do however feel like this book has a deeper meaning that I seemed to fail to grasp.

Overall, I really enjoyed this book and can’t wait to read more of Warona.

Eddie, full name Relebogile Naledi Mpho Moruakgomo, is a playwright with a glittering university career, but she's failing to get her provocative play in with any agents, especially as it's highly political and it's Brexit time. Comes a chance encounter with Whiter-than-White, well-connected Establishment boy, Hugo Lawrence Smith, whose cousin is even *that* author who became famous for their, ahem, space opera series and can now click her fingers and get a play in the West End. Can Eddie persuade Hugo to pretend to have written her play and get it to the places where her name can't open the doors? Well, turns out yes. But there are complications, in the form of the woman, Nahid, who gets to direct the play, her background and her mutual attraction with Hugo ... This is really well-plotted and definitely believeable, but where it fell down in my eyes was that in the two narrative strands, from Eddie and Hugo's points of view, their voices weren't really differentiated very much in terms of the way they "spoke" their narratives, whereas I'd have expected that given their different backgrounds, classes and experiences. Also, half the narrative is given to the headspace of the mediocre White man (though that might be a satirical point) and he doesn't seem to learn much or move from his impressively woke starting position. So not an entire success but I will be interested to see what this author does next and it's a strong start.

My blog review published 25 September: https://librofulltime.wordpress.com/2024/09/25/covid-netgalley-reading-roundup-warona-jay-jack-strange-and-chandra-clarke/