Somewhere Soft to Land: A Novel
In this crackling portrayal of friendship in peril, a young woman’s world is upended when a tragedy in her best friend’s life tests the boundaries of their sisterhood—a sharp and compelling debut novel from a Ghanaian American writer.
Dzifa has always felt a bit off. Maybe it’s the family baggage, or maybe it’s just how she’s wired. Depleted by cycles of burnout, she lives in a perpetual state of bracing: for another lost job, another lost home, another piece of evidence she isn’t doing being right. If it weren’t for the encouragement—and occasional overstepping—of her magnetic best friend, Tatiana, Dzifa doesn't know if she’d have made it as far as she has. Despite their differences, the two women share a desire to be their authentic selves, and to shed the grip of the respectability politics they’ve been taught should govern their lives.
Just as each begins to find her way, the sudden passing of Tatiana’s child upends everything. Dzifa rushes to Tatiana’s hometown to help her friend prepare for the funeral. But when she arrives, Dzifa is immersed in an unsettling conflict between two diametrically opposed families, one of whom seems intent on seeding doubt about Tatiana’s capacity as a mother. When Tatiana asks her for the ultimate favor, Dzifa must choose between loyalty at the expense of her own well-being and authenticity at the expense of her most valued friendship.
A riveting exploration of sisterhood, what it means to mother and be mothered, and what it means to be well, Somewhere Soft to Land reckons with the sometimes funny, sometimes fraught friendship between women with divergent ideologies, aspirations, personalities, and paths.
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Community Reviews
I recently read a novel with similar themes, including a toxic relationship with a parent, struggles with self esteem, and repeating the same mistakes with awareness of what one is doing. The characters were quite similar. In this book, it is Dfiza who repeats her mistakes, understands their toll on her self esteem, but makes no effort to change. Instead, she simply hopes to hide her choices from her mother and best friend Tatiana as she believes they will criticize her. Tatiana might show tough love, to borrow an expression, but her role has been to coach, encourage, and try to inspire her best friend, which Dfiza does not heed. It is no wonder, then, that Dfiza is in a chronic state of burnout.
Tatiana is charming and magnetic. She shares a similar background with Dfiza, which is helpful because Dfiza never felt she fit in. But will Dfiza do her part to move the needle?
Another theme is social performance, the need to balance one’s authentic self with the social pressure to fit in. This last trope feels the freshest. The author commented in an interview that Tatiana is a character who who can pull that off. “Play the game” is how she phrased it. This balancing act is basic to societies as it promotes a cohesive cultural identity and group harmony, but it is certainly collectivist in that it values the group over the individual. If one hopes to gain the benefits of a particular group, one must understand the cost.
Dfiza’s negative energy is a hovering malaise that saps the life out of this story. While readers can hope that eventually the ladies will find soft places to land, will we be too exhausted to care?
Thank you to Ballantine | Ballantine Books and NetGalley for providing the ARC.
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