I really enjoy reading Leslie Stephen's writing. I'm a paid subscriber to her newsletter, and I had such high hopes for this book based on how much I like it. This is why it makes me so sad to not like You're Safe Here (so much so that I've avoided writing a review of the ARC I received months ago--sorry about that, NetGalley).

I want to start with the positive--Stephens is great at world-building. She creates a world that feels like it's just on the cusp of now. It's a nuanced world with details that make it feel real and like a warning cry for our relationship with technology. Unfortunately, everything else about the book is poorly done. The relationships between the characters are really static (the protagonist and both of her love interests barely engage); we never really get to see the main cause of the tension between them, and all of it fizzles out in the most unsatisfying way. While the book initially feels like it's going to be a sci-fi thriller, it devolves into a meandering mess of mommy issues that also never feels satisfying or logical. I think the book could have been so much better if an editor probed the author's choices more and asked about motivations since the plot points feel more like half-developed ideas that end with a whimper instead of something with more grit.

Thank you, NetGalley, for the ARC of this book.