WHAT DOES IT FEEL LIKE by Sophie Kinsella

The silly season is well and truly upon us again so, keeping with tradition, I’m leaning into it with a book I’d never otherwise read but might just come to love. Last year it was Colleen Hoover. This time it’s the Shopaholic sensation herself, Sophie Kinsella. And, bunch up your Kleenex, cos it’s the one she’s based on her own experience with brain cancer. What festering boil on Ebenezer Scrooge’s arse isn’t going to give her a country mile’s worth of leeway here?

Yeah. That’s right. This festering boil.

Look, I really wanted to like this book. I was hoping I might gain some insight into Kinsella’s experience. To wade in the emotional depths of her struggle. To have her parse an extraordinarily complex and frightening medical hellscape with accessible charm. Alas, What Does It Feel Like? is to the literature of terminal disease what that kids’ game Operation is to thoracic aortic dissection repair. Minus the buzzing red nose. Granted I’m not the target demographic, but surely readers of popular fiction want, nay deserve, more than this. Oh. Wait. I just checked its Goodreads rating.

Bah humbug! I’m going back to Hoover.

What Does It Feel Like by Sophie Kinsella
Bantam, 2024
111 pages