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BOOK TOUR STOP x Random Things Tours - Tasting Sunlight by Ewald Arenz

 



"It felt good to work together. Because the other person ensured that you recognised your own place in the whole. All of a sudden, you had a significance in the whole, and you weren't simply existing."

Sally and Liss don't need anybody, they never had. But now, they might finally have someone they want. 

When young sally runs away from the rehab her parents sent her to to recover from her eating disorder, she just wants to be lone with her anger when she stumbles across Liss who is running a quiet farm far away from everyone, who silently offers her a home without demand or question.

In their silence and isolation, something stirs - a friendship, a connection between two women who on the surface have nothing in common but underneath share the same broken heart and deep loneliness. And maybe, by finally connecting with another person, they can finally reconnect with themselves. 

"It was a different kind of fury. Like … furious sympathy. She hated it. She wanted to be furious. Just furious." 

Tasting Sunlight is a profoundly beautiful and achingly emotive story about the restorative power of love and friendship.  Atmospheric and richly described, the setting was vivid and invoked a deep connection with nature through it's lyrical prose and reverence. 

Sally and Liss are both proud, troubled and alone - but slowly we see the silence fade away between them, and we see the cracks in the walls they'd built around themselves. But the beautiful thing about the cracks is sometimes they let the sunlight shine through. Time is marked clearly throughout, and we can see the instinctive progression in their relationship grow page by page - their connection an unspoken, undefined companionship that defies social convention and expectation. 

Throughout, the writing is simple and clear, but beautifully so - told in an authentically gentle voice. Arenz offers a symbolic interpretation about how trauma manifests in our minds, deeply thought provoking and evocative. 

This is a truly magical story, and now features my favourite motivational quote for when I feel the need to reconnect with the earth - "You're just as much a part of nature as a potato."



About the Author: 

Ewald Arenz was born in Nurnberg in 1965, where he now teaches.

He has won various  national and regional awards for literature; among them the Bavarian State Prize for Literature and the great  Nuremberg Prize for Literature.

One of seven children, he enjoys nature, woodturning, biking, swimming, and  drinking tea.

He lives with his family in Germany.

Follow Ewald at @EwaldArenz

#TastingSunlight #JubilantJune







Thank you to Anne at Random Things Tours and Karen at Orenda Books for inviting me to take part in this tour. I was gifted a reviewers copy of this title in return for an honest review.

Content Warnings; Self-harm, eating disorders, suicide, animal death. 

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