I got this book as my Kindle First Read for September. It was a good, quirky choice.

This funny novel details the adventures of Emily and Liv. Emily used to be an eco warrior but after a tragic event in the Amazonian Rainforest, gave it up and became an environmental studies teacher instead. She is still passionate about climate change but her days as Action Emily are over and she is now with kind but boring Miles.

Liv is an estate agent and a people pleaser who can't say no, with a hypochondriac mother and an annoying older sister whose two children are the devil's spawn, especially when reluctantly babysitted by her. She has no backbone and consequently everyone tramples over her.

One day the two of them sit in a sad café that only sells awful coffee when it gets robbed, but none of them do anything, except for a courageous Mum who later tells them a course from Fearless Inc. has helped her change her attitude. So the two of them sign up and find other people from that day in the café there as well - Vishnu, Michael and B-Money all need encouragement to get braver in their lives and careers. The course is led by Zeus without a last name who has a talent of appearing out of nowhere and achieving results with the strangest methods. It's all about finding the one fear that holds you back in life and conquering it.

This is an American book set in Chicago and my God, American really is a foreign language. After a while I stopped googling and simply accepted they have foodstuff I have never heard of. "Sitting criss-cross applesauce" instead of "cross-legged" was cute though.

I wish there had been only one FMC. I got constantly confused with the dual POV and whose words I was reading. I thought Liv was boring and I would have liked the book better if it had just been Emily talking.

I liked how this ragtag group of misfits came together and helped each other. Michael was insufferable but the others all had stuff going for them. There are too many absurd incidents to mention - I'm just saying the kidnapping and Michael and his "whoostle"! The mysterious Zeus who loves exotic birds and Taylor Swift added to the fun, the dialogue was great and I learned a lot about climate change alongside but I have no idea what the epilogue was about. Anyone?

"Fear is self-perpetuating, and it's the biggest problem we face as a society. Fear is why we hide behind our cameras instead of acting when we see something bad going on. Fear is why so many are sheep instead of sheepdogs. The wolves thrive on fear. They cultivate it. Fear is why we don't know our neighbours. Fear is what closes us off from outsiders. Fear keeps us stuck, keeps us crouched behind the couch in the dark. Fear keeps us isolated and alone. And the pandemic? That took our collective fear to an entirely new level."