Yesteryear: A GMA Book Club Pick: A Novel
#1 NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER • A GMA BOOK CLUB PICK • A NEW YORK TIMES BEST BOOK OF THE YEAR (SO FAR) • A traditional American woman, a “tradwife” influencer, suddenly awakens in the brutal reality of 1855—where she must unravel whether this living nightmare is an elaborate hoax, a twisted reality show, or something far more sinister in this sensational debut novel.
"A bold and biting satire, Yesteryear…will have you cackling and gasping right to the final page."
—Nita Prose, #1 New York Times bestselling author of The Maid series
My name was Natalie Heller Mills, and I was perfect at being alive.
Natalie lives a traditional lifestyle. Her charming farmhouse is rustic, her husband a handsome cowboy, her six children each more delightful than the last. So what if there are nannies and producers behind the scenes, her kitchen hiding industrial-grade fridges and ovens, her husband the heir to a political dynasty? What Natalie’s followers—all 8 million of them—don’t know won’t hurt them. And The Angry Women? The privileged, Ivy League, coastal elite haters who call her an antifeminist iconoclast? They’re sick with jealousy. Because Natalie isn’t simply living the good life, she’s living the ideal—and just so happens to be building an empire from it.
Until one morning she wakes up in a life that isn’t hers. Her home, her husband, her children—they’re all familiar, but something’s off. Her kitchen is warmed by a sputtering fire rather than electricity, her children are dirty and strange, and her soft-handed husband is suddenly a competent farmer. Just yesterday Natalie was curating photos of homemade jam for her Instagram, and now she’s expected to haul firewood and handwash clothes until her fingers bleed. Has she become the unwitting star of a ruthless reality show? Could it really be time travel? Is she being tested by God? By Satan? When Natalie suffers a brutal injury in the woods, she realizes two things: This is not her beautiful life, and she must escape by any means possible.
A gripping, electrifying novel that is as darkly funny as it is frightening, Yesteryear is a gimlet-eyed look at tradition, fame, faith, and the grand performance of womanhood.
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Readers say *Yesteryear* is a provocative, well-written satire exploring influencer culture, gender roles, societal pressures, and faith. Many appreci...
7.5⭐️ - rounded down for Bookclubs
I honestly don't know how I feel about this book. I think I expected some sort of fantasy style book based on what I heard about it and in reality that isn't what this is. I frankly hated every single character in this book, especially Natalie and I wasn't rooting for her or anyone else which made me feel very detached from the story. There are definitely good warnings or reflection about the world that we're living in and social media, but it was almost a weird representation of that message. It was well written and the concept is unique, but I can't say that I actually liked the book. But a counter argument for that would be that maybe that actually makes a pretty good novel and the fact that it made me think and it did make me feel something… even if that feeling is dislike. I don't think this is worth all of the hype that it has gotten, but I am glad that I read it due to the talk around it.
Welp, I read it. I can finally join The Discourse.
There seem to only be two camps on this book: you either love it or you loathe it. I'm in the "love it" camp.
This book is bonkers. Like, omg bonkers. I found it utterly unputdownable (I tore through it in about a day and a half). The story, the action between the covers, is very much a sort of trainwreck experience - you cannot look away no matter how awful it all is. And oh man, there sure is plenty of awful on these pages.
If you need to have likeable characters to enjoy a book, this is not gonna be for you. There are ebbs and flows of sympathy for the main character over the course of the novel (in fact, the deftness with which Caro Claire Burke played with my feelings about the narrator is certainly one of my favorite parts of this book), but it is extremely unlikely that she'll be somebody you ultimately root for.
But when I say "awful" and "trainwreck" and "bonkers", I mean the story being told. I do not mean the writing, which I found to be absolutely tremendous. I am astonished that this is a debut novel. It's so richly and fully realized, so commandingly authored as a singular vision and an experience, with such a strong voice, that it feels like the career highlight from somebody who's been at this for ages. I will definitely be keeping my eye out for anything Burke writes in the future.
I read this for one of my book clubs, and I have to say this is kind of the perfect book club book because there's no way anybody is gonna come out of this one with a shrug and a "it was okay, I guess". You're gonna have capital-t Thoughts for sure.
What a book!
(crossposted from my Storygraph review)
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