Book Review: "Interesting Facts about Space" by Emily Austin

Quirky characters have been all the rage, particularly in the years since the release of books like Eleanor Oliphant is Completely Fine. Sometimes the quirkiness is understandable; sometimes I feel if authors create this type of character simply to provide a vehicle for bizarre habits or behavior.

Enid is a young woman who counts among her hobbies “listening to murder stories, having casual lesbian sex, and telling my mom interesting facts about space.” She has an inexplicable fear of bald men, she’s deaf in one ear, and she’s tentatively approaching a relationship with her two half-sisters, born after her father left her mother for another woman.

But Enid also feels like she’s losing her grip, perhaps unsurprisingly given her mother’s struggles with depression. Enid grows increasingly convinced there is someone following her and trying to break into her apartment. Clearly she has some repressed trauma in her life, because why else is she experiencing these feelings?

This is a tough book with a number of emotional triggers. But it’s also a beautifully written character study, which is at turns bleak and hopeful. Others have loved this more than I did, but I’m glad I read it.

The book will publish 1/30/2024.