Reviews - I Think We've Been Here Before

274 reviews for:

I Think We've Been Here Before

Suzy Krause

3.96 AVERAGE

litlmissnikki's review

5.0

adventurous dark emotional funny hopeful informative inspiring lighthearted mysterious reflective sad tense medium-paced

Plot or Character Driven: A mix

Strong character development: Complicated

Loveable characters: Complicated

Diverse cast of characters: Complicated

Flaws of characters a main focus: Complicated

onethousandlunchtimes_jennyfer's review

5.0

challenging emotional hopeful reflective sad medium-paced

Plot or Character Driven: A mix

Loveable characters: Yes

What do you do when the end of the world coming and you can't do anything except wait?

After the world is given its expiry date courtesy of a double gamma-ray burst from a distant star, Nora is stuck in Berlin, unable to get back to Canada. A chance meeting with Jacob, with whom she get a feeling of intense deja-vu, helps her find humour and love (and a way to get home) in the last months of existence.

Meanwhile her parents, Hilda and Marlen, are processing both Marlen's cancer diagnosis, and the fact that Marlen wrote a book *about the world ending in exactly this manner*.

Meanwhile Hilda's sister, Irene, and her husband and son, Hank and Ole, respectively, are processing the news of impending doom in their own ways, leaning into conspiracy theories, raging at the sky, or trying to run away from it all.

The book is set over the course of two months, from the day the world discovers the end is nigh, and alternates between vignettes of Nora's, Hilda's, and Irene's lives. The joys and the sorrows and the little slices of life when one truly can only live in the moment, until they all come together when it matters.

I don't really know how to process this, or to classify it. It's both grim and macabre, and quirky romcommy. It's living for the now and it's fatalistic. There is rage and missteps and so much love.
And the end. Or is it the beginning? It brought me to tears. It's quirky and desperately sad and hopeful and thoought provoking and utterly indescribable.

The cat. The cat knows. What does the cat know?

This book is going to be in my head for a while as I work through it. I've never read anything like it!

~Many thanks to NetGalley for a copy of this book in exchange for an honest review. While I did recieve an ARC of this book through NetGalley, I also purchased both the audio and ebook versions.~

Content Warnings