An interesting premise for a novel: what happens if a piece of work that becomes famous under one name turns out to be the work of someone else? This book is not that simple, obviously.

Naledi is a playwright. She has sent her work to the famous Wentworth Agency under an assumed name believing that sending it under her own name (Relebogile Naledi Mpho Moruakgomo) is getting her nowhere. However once the agent Helen Hunter, meets Naledi she soon changes her mind about the play being good.

At her wits end Naledi asks an acquaintance, Hugo Lawrence Smith, to pretend the play is his. Her aim is to prove that the agency and wider theatre world is biased. Of course once the play wins a prestigious award things spiral out of control and Naledi is in danger of losing everything.

I thoroughly enjoyed 95% of this book. The characters are excellent - even if most of them aren't particularly likeable. I certainly railed enough at Hugo, Naledi and Nahid during the course of the narrative.

There was just one part of it that didn't ring true regarding Naledi's relationship with her girlfriend, Blue, after the award has been won. I simply didn't believe Naledi's reaction towards someone she purported to love. However that was the only part that grated.

Warona Jay is an author new to me but I will look out for more of her work in the future.

Thank you to Netgalley for the advance review copy.

Warona Jay's debut is a real 'heart versus head' novel. It is a detailed examination of a person, Eddie- Relebogile Moruakgomo- trying to break into the world of theatre as a playwright. She strikes up an unlikely friendship with the quintessential Hugo Lawrence Smith. Following multiple rejections of her play under her own name, she works with Hugo and they submit the play using his name. Needless to say, there are consequences, good and bad. A great expose into the clashes of gender, race and class. It is well written and a real insight into the struggles of a young artist. Warona Jay is one to watch.

Due to health issues cannot write a proper review now even if I enjoyed this book as it's well written, thought provoking, and compelling
A more extensive and proper review will follow
Recommended.
Many thanks to the publisher for this ARC, all opinions are mine

I was kindly gifted me a copy of The Grand Scheme of Things and I whizzed through it; several times I turned to my fiancé and gasped “oh this is JUICY!”. The plot is propulsive, taking the reader to unexpected places.
Relegobile Naledi Mpho Moruakgomo - aka Eddie - is sick of being shafted by the theatre industry; after years of hard graft and sacrifice, her play is still being rejected left, right and centre. And so she enlists her white male friend, Hugo Lawrence-Smith to submit her play under his name. Eddie meets Hugo by chance in a coffee shop - he is a wealthy, privileged white boy who wants to shake off a dull legal career as well as his parent’s expectations. He takes a shine to Eddie and a friendship forms between the two. And so, when Eddie suggests Hugo be the face of Eddie’s play, it seems like a perfect ploy to expose the racism and hypocrisy of the theatre world. Shenanigans ensue!

Warona Jay’s voice is sharp, fresh and fearless; she packs an awful lot into this little book, from the racism & classism of the theatre industry to sexuality and coming out. The novel fizzes with energy and, at times, anger, which for me really helped me connect to two characters so unlike myself. It’s also very funny and a couple of times, I laughed out loud - usually at the acerbic wit of Eddie.

A few things didn’t work for me - the ending, set several years after the rest of the novel, felt a little too pat, and I would have liked Hugo to have been written with a little more complexity as a character. Both himself and Eddie show themselves to be distinctly unlikeable in different ways as the novel progresses, but I found myself whispering “good for her” in Eddie’s sections and wincing in Hugo’s.

If you liked Dominoes by Phoebe Mackintosh or Yellowface by RF Kuang, you’ll find a lot to love here. It’s exciting, engaging and gave me plenty of food for thought; it’s a really fresh and exciting debut that I’ll be recommending widely.

A very refreshing debut from Warona with an interesting plotline and characters. The book follows playwright Eddie who is originally from Africa and living in London. She keeps getting rejected when sending off her most recent play and has a suspicion its due to her name and being a woman of colour. When she meets 22 year old white Hugo she persuades him to take on the play in his name, which he does and immediately it becomes a success winning awards and being a sell out show. The book focuses on relationships, lies and friendships and takes us through the years after the show debuts with topics such as racism , adultery and secrets discussed. I didn't really like Eddie as a character if I am honest, she comes across as selfish and everything being all about her although I did like Hugo as a main character with his point of view as character also being told. I enjoyed reading this and will be recommending

This one had me hooked from its description and I found it extremely captivating. The concept is brilliant, I think at times it veered a little into murky waters and flowed away form the main storyline a little too much for me, but also who doesn’t love some colour to the landscape, so some extra details about our characters is never a bad thing either, that’s just a personal preference for me
-
That also didn’t take anything away from he fact this was an immensely interesting read and one I feel will start many a conversation and would be an amazing book club pick!
-
Thank you to the publisher and netgalley for the ARC

This sounded really intriguing - two characters tackle the embedded racism and prejudice in the Theatre world by submitting Eddie's socio-political dystopian play, heavily centred on her own upbringing as a Black second-generation immigrant, under Hugo Lawrence Smith's name, a white, privileged trust-fund kid who's bored of his direct path into Law.

The first half is great - the writing is witty, and Eddie's character is clearly realised and realistic, as she navigates rejection after rejection of her play, struggling with the cards stacked against her. The issue is this book starts to lose me when it becomes borderline a fake-dating romance and Eddie becomes irrational and judgemental, as does Nahid. Hugo comes out looking like the level-headed one stuck in the middle...which maybe is intentional? To show how no matter what, the white man comes out on top?

I don't know - the concept was great, the first half was great and then it started to lose trajectory for me. The pacing was off - we reach the opening night of the play just before the halfway mark, and I wasn't really convinced about where this was going from here.

I still think it's an interesting read, and a good discussion starter, I just wish the second half held up a bit more.

This novel took me a while to get into; at one point I nearly gave up. I felt I needed to persevere as the author obviously had something important to say. The cultures and backgrounds of the main protagonists vary considerably; one black girl, an aspiring playwright, from a middle class background struggling to get her first play accepted and one young man from a privileged background, destined for the law. It’s an odd combination, so when they invent a ruse to get Eddie’s work taken seriously, design a complex scheme to achieve success. It’s beneath the surface that the cross-currents in the theatre industry are revealed. A clever and thought-provoking tale that warrants a read.

My thanks to NetGalley and the publishers for this opportunity to read and review.

3.5 stars.
The idea of a Black (discriminated against, underrepresented) playwright facing racism and discrimination and fighting against these via unusual ways is not entirely original except for the nuances. Yet, this book has some strong nuances.
The authentic experiences of Eddie were strong.
As for the story as a whole and the prose, I found it lacking in layers a bit.
Premise 2.5
Plot 3
Themes 4
Characterisation 3
Prose 3.5

I loved the premise of this book but unfortunately did not live up to my expectations. I think that I am not the target audience.
I agree with the premise that white and male gets top billing and that there is a lot of bias towards other genders and ethnicity. It should not be the case in the world today but it still is unfortunately.

Relegobile Naledi Mpho Moruakgomo is an aspiring playwright who graduates top of her class and writes a brilliant play that nobody wants to know about. She tries changing her name to get her foot in the door, but when the agents see that it is a black, female, foot, she is rejected once again. Until she meets Hugo Lawrence Smith, a wealthy, privileged white boy who wants to shake off a dull legal career and embrace life in the theatre. Between them, they cook up a scheme to get Eddie's play entwined with Hugo's privilege with the idea that they will, when success comes knocking, expose the racism and hypocrisy of the theatre world forever. Unfortunately things don't go entirely as planned.

When I first started this I had a sinking feeling that this would be too much like Yellowface by R. F. Kuang, but it defied all my expectations. This is smart, funny, angry and really clever. Jay's voice is fresh and the plot twists in ways that make this unpredictable in all the best ways and altogether a really satisfying read.

This is a gripping and thought-provoking read. Drama graduate Relebogile Naledi Mpho Moruakgomo (sometimes known as Eddie Morua before then settling on Naledi) meets Hugo Lawrence Smith at a cafe in October 2015. She has just written her first play and is determined to make a success of it. Unfortunately, her skin colour, her convoluted name and lack of connections means that she is turned down by the Wentworth Agency. Hugo, on the other hand, has a double-barreled quintessentially English name, white skin, a mother who is a professor in English Literature, whilst at the same time being related to an already famous writer. What if ‘The Worthy’ became ‘Great Belonging’ and was credited to Hugo?

Naledi and Hugo’s ploy initially pays dividend. The play is an award-winning triumph and sells out the Regium Theatre in its initial run. It also makes a name of the ‘playwright’ and the young director at the helm. However, Naledi’s need for success can only be vicarious - even if she is starting to build a reputation as a small-scale journalist. Can that be enough for her? Hugo also faces the pressure of what next for the young breakout playwright, at the same time as conducting a clandestine affair with its director. Neither characters are particularly likeable … but that is rather the point.

Warona Joy deals with the themes of class, gender, race, identity and the snobbery of the theatre world in pulsating fashion. Combining wit and humour with moments of great pathos as the young protagonists struggle to navigate their way through the complex web of their own making, Joy provides the reader with lots to entertain as well as ponder.

Good concept for plot and it held my interest but I did feel the characters were quite flat and I wasn't overly keen on the writing style. But overall a good read

What an important topic and a complex resolution the author is exploring here.
The main character having a play submitted to an agency rejected spends the important part of her life for the next few years devoted to righting what she considers to be a wrong.
This novel explores lots of different types of relationships, introduces the reader to various different types of people not normally met.
Not knowing what she is starting when she rolls the pebble from the top of the mountain, she is frequently sideswiped by the onrushing snowball of emotions and debris.
Considering that the novel is not overly long, it is amazing how much the author packs into this thought provoking, enthralling novel.
I really liked it, although it was a little too complex for my tastes, the writing was superb, the characters great, but not all good.
I am certainly looking forward to more novels from this author.
My thanks to the author for a brilliant story. I received an advance review copy for free, and I am leaving this review voluntarily.

I really thought I'd love this but I found myself struggling to connect with it. The plot was great, there's been a lot of this kind of story over the last few years but I think this was a solid version. But there was something about the writing style that kept me at a distance. None of the characters ever felt real to me. I felt like I was observing from the outside and it wasn't super comfortable. Seems to have a lot of love, so maybe just a style I didn't gel with.

Warona Jay's debut novel, The Grand Scheme of Things, is a novel about the literary world, and how race can change the perspective of the piece. There are some very big questions bubbling under the surface which could so easily have overwhelmed the story. Jay is able to manage these themes by focusing on her central characters - Naledi, who writes a play about the immigrant experience but experiences rejection from publisher and Hugo, who resubmits the play under his name and achieves a hit. This literary duplicity is at the heart of the novel and provides some great sequences. Along the way Jay has some fun poking at the establishment and at a veiled JK Rowling in particular. This was a fun read ultimately, easy to read and engaging and I can easily see it making some best of lists at the end of the year.

Thanks to Netgalley and the publishers for the ARC.

This is a story about Naledi, daughter of immigrants from Botswana, and her desperation to make it as a playwright in Britain in a post-Brexit era. It’s pretty meta in the sense that her dystopian play is about “national identity, citizenship, capitalism, that sort of thing” while the novel itself is also about those things.

Given her background, skin colour, and lack of connections, Naledi has been unable to make a breakthrough. This changes when she befriends Hugo, a rich white man from law school and ties to a famous author whose own cushy life is ripe for an upheaval. They come up with a scheme to get Naledi’s play on a stage—Hugo will resubmit her play under his name, pretending that it was actually his all along but he didn’t want to receive flak for writing about the immigrant experience from his privileged POV, and then after opening week, they would reveal the truth to everyone and expose the theatre industry for its racism and xenophobia.

Everything goes swimmingly until Hugo falls in love with the director of Naledi’s play, who is already a married woman and only at the beginning of her directorial career. To keep their affair from ruining the play’s chances, Naledi and Hugo pretend that they are dating, which opens up a whole other can of worms.

The writing was a little hard to get through sometimes but I enjoyed the barbs and the feeling that shit might hit the fan at any moment. The characters seemed a little flat, especially for Hugo, because from start to end he was such a Good White Man, an outlier of his race, fully aware of his privilege at all times and completely willing to do anything to uplift his Black friend. Making him a serial cheater seemed to be thrown in there just to make sure that we don’t like him too much and that we know he is ultimately still part of the enemy camp. It would have been more nuanced if he was revealed to be a little bit racist/ entitled, like all his friends and family.

I want to love this book so much because the plot is brilliant. The twists, turns and themes are as riveting as they are important.

But the dialogue and characters didn’t feel very real to me, and the writing felt more matter-of-fact than descriptive. A (rare) metaphor that stood out to me (because it made me wince) was describing a kiss as two stamps that were running low on ink. Eeesch. One of the main characters is also suddenly disgraced when the story jumps ahead 4 years. That change of pace felt like a clothesline to the throat.

The plot 100% carried me through though. Very mixed feelings! 2.5 stars rounded up to 3.

Published 12 September 2024. Relebogile Naledi Mpho Moruakgomo calls herself Eddie because it is easier than having to constantly correct people when they invariably pronounce her real name incorrectly. So when she writes a play about the immigration experience in modern Britain, she feels that her real name, her identity, will immediately lead to agents turning her down. Therefore she sends her play out under a typical white male name and immediately get a response. However, when she sets foot into the office of this highly regarded theatrical agent, any interest in the play immediately wanes. A chance meeting with Hugo Lawrence Smith in a coffee shop where prompts her to suggest a plan that could see her play performed. Hugo will pass it off as his own work! Then, when the play has achieved a reasonable level of success, the truth will be revealed about the racism in the industry. I liked the idea but what slightly thrown off balance when relationships seemed to take centre stage and I was left thinking - why? For me it blurred the boundaries - I would rather the focus had been on the plays journey rather than who Hugo was sleeping with as I felt that the point being made was an important one. As for the characters, I found Eddie and Hugo to be unlikeable, preferring Blue, Eddie's girlfriend and Nahid, the play's director. A book that has a very valid message.

This was a really powerful novel exposing racism within the sector in a compelling but also entertaining way. The writing was sharp and I really didn't want it to end