Remarkably Bright Creatures
Shelby Van Pelt, 2022
Mystery, thriller & crime Contemporary fiction
A grieving aquarium cleaner, a teenager with no direction, and the giant Pacific octopus quietly working to put them in each other's path. A warm, gently witty story with a melancholy undertow, moving at an unhurried pace between solitude and quiet friendship.
Feels like tenderness, melancholy and wonder. About friendship, solitude and love.
Who it’s for
You may like it if you enjoy character-driven stories where lonely people slowly find each other, with an octopus adding dry humor and tenderness. The grief and solitude are real, so it may not suit you if you want something breezy from start to finish.
Why read it
A good choice when you want warmth without easy answers; the octopus's wry voice gives the sadness a surprising lift.
A page from the book
Someone is quietly making plans to fix a heart that isn't his.
As a general rule, I like holes. A hole at the top of my tank gives me freedom. But I do not like the hole in her heart. She only has one, not three, like me. Tova’s heart. I will do everything I can to help her fill it. Shelby Van Pelt.Van Pelt's debut novel, published when she was in her forties, was a Read With Jenna book club pick and spent months on the New York Times bestseller list.
Books that feel like this
The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society
Mary Ann Shaffer, 2008
Also tenderness and friendship.
Where to get it
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Questions readers ask
- Is Remarkably Bright Creatures for me?
- You may like it if you enjoy character-driven stories where lonely people slowly find each other, with an octopus adding dry humor and tenderness. The grief and solitude are real, so it may not suit you if you want something breezy from start to finish.
- What is Remarkably Bright Creatures like?
- A warm, gently witty story with a melancholy undertow, moving at an unhurried pace between solitude and quiet friendship. Feels like tenderness, melancholy and wonder. About friendship, solitude and love.
- What should I read after Remarkably Bright Creatures?
- If you liked Remarkably Bright Creatures, try The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society (Mary Ann Shaffer), A Man Called Ove (Fredrik Backman) and Conversations with Friends (Sally Rooney).
A taste of the feed
The invisible duel that happens across a shop counter.
Another silence, as if two gunmen have suddenly realized they have forgotten to bring their pistols. Ove looks at the box for a long time, as though he’s waiting for it to make a confession.
A Man Called Ove · Fredrik Backman
The person whose description of you becomes the way you see yourself.
After school we used to lie in her room listening to music and talking about why we liked each other. These were long and intense conversations, and felt so momentous to me that I secretly transcribed parts of them from memory in the evenings. When Bobbi talked about me it felt like seeing myself in a mirror for the first time. I also looked in actual mirrors more often. I started taking a close interest in my face and body, which I’d never done before. I asked Bobbi questions like: do I have long legs? Or short?
Conversations with Friends · Sally Rooney
The oldest child who learned to keep everything buttoned up.
Alex Nilsen is a study in control. In that tall, broad, permanently slouched and/or pretzel-folded body of his, there’s a surplus of stoicism (the result of being the oldest child of a widower with the most vocal anxiety of anyone I’ve ever met) and a stockpile of repression (the result of a strict religious upbringing in direct opposition to most of his passions; namely, academia), alongside the most truly strange, secretly silly, and intensely softhearted goofball I’ve had the pleasure to know.
People We Meet on Vacation · Emily Henry
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