Published By: Hutchinson Heinemann
Pages: 240
Released On: 02/04/2026
There’s no health guru in Sweden better than Cassi. Couple’s therapy? Puppy yoga? Full moon rituals? She’s got everyone in the remote village of Bäcken covered. The locals don’t really know who Cassi is or how she managed to turn a derelict cottage into a successful self help retreat, but one thing is clear: they’re all willing to pay good money for her services.
There’s only one problem: Cassi is a fraud. A great one at that, who has concealed her true self – a jobless, depressed alcoholic – and gotten rich in the process. But can a life based on a lie really last? And will her new friends accept her for who she really is when her secrets eventually come to the surface?
*****
Thanks to NetGalley and Hutchinson Heinemann for the advanced copy of this title in return for an honest review.
I thought this was non-fiction before I started it. I’m not sure why but it sounded like something someone would have done. But once I figured out it was fiction, I realised it sounded really fun and I was really looking forward to it.
It was missing something, but annoyingly I don’t know what. I enjoyed it, it’s got interesting writing, interesting characters, and I would recommend it. But throughout it I kept waiting for something to happen, to make it into a really good book, but it felt like it kept knocking on the ceiling but couldn’t quite break through.
It is quite….flat. The plot, characters, the meaning, it’s all very surface level and doesn’t go into much depth.
Cassi is not a likeable main character, maybe because she is so flat. She’s annoying and I couldn’t find any empathy for her situation. The secondary characters also haven’t been developed enough and just felt a bit like caricatures of city vs. country folk.
It is a relatively short book but it felt long. It got better as it went along but the start was quite a slog.
It’s quite a light book and parts of it are familiar and relatable and funny.
It looks at topics including mental health, loneliness, community, a sense of belonging, obstacles, and that everyone is fighting a battle we don’t know about.
It was an okay book, it passed some time, but it won’t stick with me long after.
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