By: Liane Moriarty
Narrators: Caroline Lee, Geraldine Hakewill Random House Audio
ISBN: 9780593798607
Publisher: Crown Publishing
Publication Date: 09/10/2024
Format: Other
My Rating: 5 Stars (ARC)
“A riveting story so wild you don’t know how she’ll land it, and then she does, on a dime.”—Anne Lamott, #1 New York Times bestselling author
If you knew your future, would you try to fight fate?
Aside from a delay, there will be no problems. The flight will be smooth, it will land safely. Everyone who gets on the plane will get off. But almost all of them will be forever changed.
Because on this ordinary, short, domestic flight, something extraordinary happens. People learn how and when they are going to die. For some, their death is far in the future—age 103!—and they laugh. But for six passengers, their predicted deaths are not far away at all.
How do they know this? There were ostensibly more interesting people on the flight (the bride and groom, the jittery, possibly famous woman, the giant Hemsworth-esque guy who looks like an off-duty superhero, the frazzled, gorgeous flight attendant) but none would become as famous as “The Death Lady.”
Not a single passenger or crew member will later recall noticing her board the plane. She wasn’t exceptionally old or young, rude or polite. She wasn’t drunk or nervous or pregnant. Her appearance and demeanor were unremarkable. But what she did on that flight was truly remarkable.
A few months later, one passenger dies exactly as she predicted. Then two more passengers die, again, as she said they would. Soon no one is thinking this is simply an entertaining story at a cocktail party.
If you were told you only had a certain amount of time left to live, would you do things differently? Would you try to dodge your destiny?
Liane Moriarty’s Here One Moment is a brilliantly constructed tale that looks at free will and destiny, grief and love, and the endless struggle to maintain certainty and control in an uncertain world. A modern-day Jane Austen who humorously skewers social mores while spinning a web of mystery, Moriarty asks profound questions in her newest I-can’t-wait-to-find-out-what-happens novel.
Praise
“Unputdownable . . . propulsive, philosophically rich saga.”
—Oprah Daily
“Everything we loved about Moriarty’s Big Little Lies—the pacing, the twists, the taut energy—is here, in a high-flying exploration of free will and destiny.”
—Good Housekeeping, Book of the Month Book Club Pick
“A riveting story so wild you don’t know how she’ll land it, and then she does, on a dime.”
—Anne Lamott, #1 New York Times bestselling author
“Funny, frightening, heartbreaking, and life-affirming. I adored Here One Moment.”
—Chris Whitaker, New York Times bestselling author of All the Colors of the Dark
“Liane Moriarty is a genuine GENIUS. Here One Moment is off-the-scale brilliant.”
—Marian Keyes, international bestselling author of Watermelon and Again, Rachel
“The story is a brilliant, charming, and invigorating illustration of its closing quote from Elisabeth Kübler-Ross (we’re not going to spill that). A fresh, funny, ambitious, and nuanced take on some of our oldest existential questions.”
―Kirkus Review, starred review
“. . . meticulously plotted . . . exquisitely rendered characters . . . Moriarty has outdone herself.”
—Publishers Weekly, starred review
My Review
From the #1 NYT bestselling author, Liane Moriarty returns with HERE ONE MOMENT, a stand-out, compelling, unique, and thought-provoking story of free will, reflection, fate, destiny, grief, and love.
If you knew your future, would you try to defy fate?
About...
The plane is jam-packed. Every seat is taken. The flight is delayed, adding to the suspense of the unknown journey ahead.
Later, no one will recall seeing the lady board the flight at Hobart Airport. Nothing about her caught anyone's attention or raised a red flag. She was not frazzled, drunk, belligerent, grumpy, famous, frail, chatty, or fearful.
The lady was nothing that anyone will recall later.
It was just another routine flight from Hobart to Sydney. But one passenger on board, a seemingly ordinary lady, will change the lives of everyone she meets, leaving a profound impact.
There is a flight delay on the 3:20 pm flight. No one will remember hearing the lady speak a single word during the delay. She is traveling alone. Seat 4D. An aisle seat. She is a lady. Small. Petite. Older. UNTIL...
Later known as "The Death Lady."
My thoughts...
Wild and cleverly creative, HERE ONE MOMENT is riveting! Everyone is alarmed when this woman stands up and begins to make predictions about how and when everyone on board will DIE!
Some will heed the warnings, and others will dismiss her. But all on board will be forever changed, their lives transformed by the power of her predictions.
The author proposes thought-provoking questions about how you would live your life if you knew how and when it would end. What would you do differently?
Would you remain with the person you are with or someone else? What about jobs, careers, personal lives, family, friends, lovers, or enemies? The author's thought-provoking questions prompt you to consider what would be different if you knew the course of your life.
The lady's predictions raise profound questions about free will. Are all your decisions and actions inevitable, or can you defy fate? The author's exploration of these themes will leave you pondering the nature of choice and destiny.
I enjoyed how the author wrote the story from different POVs: compelling, heartbreaking, charming, uplifting, witty, frightening, and fearful. This reminded me that the butterfly effect rests on the notion that the world is deeply interconnected, such that one small occurrence can influence a much larger, complex system. Hence, the beautiful front cover!
Love this quote:
"It is only when we truly know and understand that we have a limited time on Earth and that we have no way of knowing when our time is up that we begin to live each day to the fullest as if it were the only one we had." —Elisabeth Kubler-Ross
Recs...
HERE ONE MOMENT is for fans of the author and those who enjoy Rea Frey, Sarah Jio, Elizabeth Berg, Suzanne Redfearn, Catherine Ryan Hyde, Fredrik Backman, and Sarah Addison Allen.
Thanks to Crown Publishing and NetGalley for a gifted digital ARC in exchange for an honest review.
@JudithDCollins | #JDCMustReadBooks
My Rating: 5 Stars
Pub Date: Sep 10, 2024
About the Author
Photo by über photography
Liane Moriarty is the author of the #1 New York Times bestsellers Big Little Lies, Apples Never Fall, The Husband’s Secret, and Truly Madly Guilty; the New York Times bestsellers Nine Perfect Strangers, What Alice Forgot, and The Last Anniversary; The Hypnotist’s Love Story; and Three Wishes. She lives in Sydney, Australia, with her husband and two children. WEBSITE
