I Think We've Been Here Before

A Novel

De: Suzy Krause

Narrado por: Erin Moon

With the end of the world predicted, reality bends in an unexpectedly quirky novel about human connection and the meaning of life and death by the bestselling author of Sorry I Missed You.

Marlen and Hilda Jorgensen’s family has received two significant pieces of news: one, Marlen has been diagnosed with a terminal illness. Two, a cosmic blast is set to render humanity extinct within a matter of months. It seems the coming Christmas on their Saskatchewan farm could be their last.

Preparing for the inevitable, they navigate the time they have left together. Marlen and Hilda have channeled their energy into improbably prophetic works of art. Hilda’s elderly father receives a longed-for visitor from his past. Hilda’s teenaged nephew goes missing, and his mother refuses to believe the world is ending. All the while, Hilda’s daughter struggles to find her way home from Berlin with the help of an oddly familiar stranger. For everyone, there’s an unsettling feeling that this unprecedented reality is something they remember.

As the planet holds its collective breath to see what happens next amid chaos, denial, acceptance, and hope, this one family determines to live every moment as if it’s their last. Because, well, it just might be.

©2024 by Suzy Krause. (P)2024 Brilliance Publishing, Inc., all rights reserved.

Reseñas de la Crítica

“Erin Moon regales listeners with this close-up look at the inner workings of a family that is faced with coinciding personal and global crises.… Moon capably balances portrayals of the extended family members who gather on the family farm at Christmastime and the underlying comedy scattered throughout the story. Her pacing enhances the reflective tone, and she maintains the tension of the multiple looming disasters. Overall, Moon's narration maximizes the quirkiness of this tale of love, impending loss, and certain doom. Why quirky? Because some way, somehow, everyone is starting to think they might have done all of this together before.” —AudioFile Magazine

“A story that will linger in the mind and memory of the reader long after the novel has been finished and set back upon the shelf…highly recommended.” —Midwest Book Review

“I Think We’ve Been Here Before is a rare gem of a book, the kind that instantly inspires you to sit up and pay attention, because something special is unfolding on the page. I don’t know what I loved most—the memorable characters, gripping premise, insightful prose, or nearly perfect ending. Suzy Krause writes with a magical touch.” —Jessica Strawser, USA Today bestselling author of The Last Caretaker

I will love reading all her books

I'm a Suzy Krause superfan, so this was a must purchase for me. I was still surprised by how much I love this book, though. I wasn't expecting the story to go where it went - at all. I ordered it and started it knowing nothing, and I'll be asking my book people to trust me: start it without reading the blurb. I loved not knowing anything.

Hopeful End

This book was such a good pick for that time between the end of a the year and the new year. It's sad, but in a way, hopeful for the future.

Almost perfect

I loved this book so much and the narration was spot on. There were a couple of funky spots but it was overall, beautifully executed.

Great read!

This book has a lot of Interesting characters, and I enjoyed them all (and there are a lot of personalities here!) It’s a story of family, with major conflict-internal and external, past, present and the big terrible future. A little drag in some places but definitely worth read if you like light this genre.

DNF - the world is ending? Answer your GD phone

Magical realism my foot. I would love to get to some magical realism. Some fun play with physics and theory and what ifs. But the very concept of this character being so besieged by her life that if she were to answer her mom's call when it's come to light that the world is coming to an imminent end and now - and not a minute later - is the time for her to "grow up and be her own woman"? As a grown ass woman, mother and daughter, no. If the defenders of this story is "she knows she's making a poor choice but it's the obvious poor choice that's the catalyst of the narrative!" I say that's lazy and like this character, a poor choice to upon which to build a plot.

What is going on?

The voices that the voice actor makes almost makes this unbearable. The story maybe could’ve been good but it just really fell flat in a lot of places

Uh...what was this about?

2 hours in, I gave up. The blurb says it's about Marlen and Hilde but mostly it seemed to be about this boring young woman named Nora and her obnoxious roommates. And 2 hours in, nothing had really happened. I WAS actually interested in the Marlen/Hilde part but after a initial chapter, the focus switched to endlessly boring stuff about young people in Berlin and how they feel about everything, including why Nora (a Canadian) never bothered to figure out what the equivalent of the 911 number is in Germany, because she was too stupid to ever ask. DNF. I'm returning it.