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All This Could Be Different

by Sarah Thankam Mathews

Building a home amid uncertainty

Critically Recognized
Regular price $17.51 USD
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Awards & Recognition

  • Award recognition

    2022 National Book Award finalist

    2022 National Book Award finalist

  • Editorial selection

    Los Angeles Times' Top 5 Fiction Books of the Year

    One of the Los Angeles Times' Top 5 Fiction Books of the Year

  • Critical praise

    Entertainment Weekly praise: “Dazzling and wholly original”

    Entertainment Weekly praised the novel's originality, wit, insight, and specificity.

AlbakiReads Editorial

Building a home amid uncertainty

Set in Milwaukee during an American recession, the novel follows Sneha, an immigrant from India navigating an entry-level corporate job, financial pressures, and new relationships. Her connections with friends Tig and Thom and her growing romance with Marina unfold alongside concerns about work, housing, and the money she sends to her parents. The book brings these strands together as a portrait of young adults trying to build forms of love and community amid economic insecurity, while Sneha works through questions of intimacy and belonging.

Good fit for readers who enjoy

  • Readers interested in coming-of-age fiction centered on young adults navigating work and financial uncertainty.
  • Readers seeking fiction about queer relationships, friendship, and community.
  • Readers interested in immigrant experiences and the search for a sense of home.

Themes

Coming of ageImmigration and belongingQueer loveFriendship and communityEconomic precarity

Based on publisher information and book metadata.

Book overview

2022 NATIONAL BOOK AWARD FINALIST

ONE OF THE LOS ANGELES TIMES' TOP 5 FICTION BOOKS OF THE YEAR

ONE OF TIME AND SLATE'S TOP 10 BOOKS OF THE YEAR

Named one of the BEST BOOKS OF 2022 by NPR, Vogue, Vulture, BuzzFeed, Harper's Bazaar, and more

"One of the buzziest, most human novels of the year...breathless, dizzying, and completely beautiful." --Vogue

"Dazzling and wholly original...[written] with such mordant wit, insight, and specificity, it feels like watching a new literary star being born in real time." --Entertainment Weekly

From a brilliant new voice comes an electrifying novel of a young immigrant building a life for herself--a warm, dazzling, and profound saga of queer love, friendship, work, and precarity in twenty-first century America


Graduating into the long maw of an American recession, Sneha is one of the fortunate ones. She's moved to Milwaukee for an entry-level corporate job that, grueling as it may be, is the key that unlocks every door: she can pick up the tab at dinner with her new friend Tig, get her college buddy Thom hired alongside her, and send money to her parents back in India. She begins dating women--soon developing a burning crush on Marina, a beguiling and beautiful dancer who always seems just out of reach.

But before long, trouble arrives. Painful secrets rear their heads; jobs go off the rails; evictions loom. Sneha struggles to be truly close and open with anybody, even as her friendships deepen, even as she throws herself headlong into a dizzying romance with Marina. It's then that Tig begins to draw up a radical solution to their problems, hoping to save them all.

A beautiful and capacious novel rendered in singular, unforgettable prose, All This Could Be Different is a wise, tender, and riveting group portrait of young people forging love and community amidst struggle, and a moving story of one immigrant's journey to make her home in the world.
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Customer reviews

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Malaika Taylor

I highly recommend to for anyone looking for inner clarity

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Thomas DiMassa

Great service and fast service

Great shopping experience! The book arrived quickly, was well packaged, and matched the description perfectly. I would definitely shop with you again

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Olivia

Smooth.