Greta and Valdin

<b>Rebecca K Reilly</b> (Ngaati Hine Ngaati Rehua Ngaatiwai ki Aotea) is a Maaori novelist from Waitaakere New Zealand. She has a BA (hons) in German and European studies from the University of Auckland and an MA from the International Institute of Modern Letters at Victoria University of Wellington where she won the Adam Foundation Prize in Creative Writing for 2019. <p><b>'Warm witty and utterly idiosyncratic' ALICE SLATER<br><br>Siblings Greta and Valdin have perhaps too much in common. They're flatmates beholden to the same near-unpronounceable surname and both make questionable choices when it comes to love.</b><br><br>Valdin is still in love with his ex-boyfriend Xabi who left the country because he thought he was making Valdin sad. Greta is in love with fellow English tutor Holly who only seems to be using her for admin support. But perhaps all is not lost. Valdin is coming to realize that he might not be so unlovable and Greta that she might be worth more than the papers she can mark.<br><br>Helping the siblings navigate queerness multiracial identity and the tendency of their love interests to either leave the country or not love them back is the whole Vladisavljevic family: Maori-Russian-Catalonian and as passionate and loving as they are eccentric and over-emotional.<br><br>Rebecca K. Reilly's exploration of love family karaoke and the generational reverberations of colonialism will make you laugh might make you cry and will certainly make you fall in love with Greta Valdin and all of the Vladisavljevics.</p> <i>Greta & Valdin </i>is hilarious touching and hotly sublime. <b>The kind of novel that simultaneously makes me wish I were funnier and absolves me from the need to try - I'll never be as funny as Rebecca K Reilly</b> (and that's ok) <b>A big fat slice of joyful queer family life peppered with messy breakups bad dates and terrible decisions. You’re gonna fall in love with the warm witty and utterly idiosyncratic <i>Greta & Valdin</i></b> <b><i>Greta & Valdin</i> is one of the few genuinely funny books I've ever read. </b>Totally delightful psychologically astute and dry as an astronaut's space cracker. It’s like if Elif Batuman wrote <i>Franny & Zooey</i> but gay. I want the whole thing as a lower back tattoo GRETA AND VALDIN feels somehow totally new and beautifully familiar at the same time like the kind of book you've been longing to read your whole life. Part comedy of manners part family epic and all contained within a compulsive charming clutch of pages we couldn't put down. <b>Both ruthless and hilarious offering hope and a wink for queer romantics everywhere</b> An absolute delight … <b>a gloriously picaresque celebration of messy complicated love</b>