Friday Friyay: 'The Wonder State' by Sara Flannery Murphy

Lol remember last week when I thought that once the semester was over I'd have time?! This week has flooooown by and I have no idea where the time has gone. I think I've technically been productive but I don't know how much I have to show for it. Definitely no reviews... This weekend I'll be spending some time on a train, though, so hopefully that'll give me some hours of reading time! One of the books I really, really need to read is The Wonder State by Sara Flannery Murphy. It came out last month and I am so in the mood for a small town drama, a group of friends reunited, and a weird house with a weirder power!

From the author of Girl One comes a spellbinding adventure about a strange power lurking in the Arkansas Ozarks, and the group of friends obsessed with finding it.

Five friends arrive back in Eternal Springs, the small town they all fled after high-school graduation. Each of them is drawn home by a cryptic, scrawled two-word letter: You promised.

It has been fifteen years since that life-changing summer, and they're anxious to find out why Brandi called them back, especially when they vowed never to return.

But Brandi is missing. She'd been acting erratically for months, in and out of rehab, railing at whoever might listen about magic all around them. About a power they can't see. And strange houses that appear only when you need them . . .

Told in two enthralling time lines, The Wonder State is a stunning, immersive follow-up to Girl One. Sara Flannery Murphy has created another dazzling, genre-blurring novel—an adventure story laced with nostalgia and magic, exploring belonging and the lasting power of community.

Book Beginnings is at home on Rose City Reader, hosted by Gilion Dumas, and Friday 56 at Freda's Voice, hosted by Freda. I'll also be joining the Book Blogger Hop, hosted by Billy over at Ramblings of a Coffee Addicted Writer. All quotes are taken from an ARC and may be different in the published
book.

BB:

'May 3, 2015

Now

Brandi Addams is finally leaving Eternal Springs. She's been planning it under their noses for months, and nobody suspects a thing. After thirty-two years, Brandi is as much a part of Eternal Springs as tornado season, or the springs that burst fever-warm from the ground.' p.1

I really like this opening, although I'm already sad about Brandi going missing. I'm kind of hoping she is not "missing"-missing, but voluntarily absent, if that makes sense? I like the description of her as being part of the natural environment of Eternal Springs, there are some people who seem to belong to a place and yet maybe they might be the most desperate to leave it.

F56: 

'"And nobody knows we're here now," Charlie shoots back. "If anybody had suspicions, we've confirmed them with a glaring neon sign. You saw the way they were looking at us." p.56

Oooh tenssionn. I had to cut this quote of a little before its end for potential spoiler reasons, but it definitely had me extra intrigued. I've no idea what's going on here in the novel, but if there are already people with suspicions then the novel sure does ramp up quickly!

BBH:

This week's question comes from Billy himself:

What fictional character would you most like to meet in person?

Seriously, every week these questions are so interesting. I thought I'd have to think about this for a very long time, but then I immediately thought of Monica Byrne's The Actual Star. I'm gonna cheat a little and say that I would love to talk to all of the main characters in this novel, from all three time-lines. In a sense, they're all mirrors of each other, all inheritors of each other's legacies, so I'm technically still only talking to like 3 characters max.... I just adore this novel and there is such deep thinking behind it that I can imagine that speaking to these characters would be at once painful, soothing, and revelatory. 

Honestly, please just read The Actual Star!

And that's it for me this week! What are you reading? And who would you be meeting and talking to?