Skye Falling

From the first page, I found a kindred spirit in Skye, the unfiltered, big-hearted narrator of Skye Falling. Jaded, a loner, and the kind of person who books international flights in order to avoid unpleasant conversations, Skye’s twin tasks are to harness the last bit of energy she can muster to finally confront old emotional wounds from childhood while also making room in her life for new people, so she can begin really living life, instead of continuing to let life happen to her. More importantly, she needs to lighten up and get laid!

We first meet Skye hungover and catatonic. She’s by this point convinced herself she doesn’t need anyone: not her family, whose calls she constantly dodges, not her friends, whose calls she also usually ignores, not a partner, not even a microwave. But all that changes when Vicky, the now precocious 12-year-old “egg” Skye sold to an old friend for $5000, shows up and forces Skye to stand still—when all she wants to do is run. Oh, and Skye has a crush on Vicky’s aunt, just to make it more awkward.

Self-deprecating and legitimately hilarious, Skye’s a narrator that sticks to you. You can’t get her thoughts out of your head to the point where you think you’re actually friends with her, and you’re like “Oh I should text Skye and ask about that whole egg situation,” and you have to remind yourself you’ve never met Skye and in fact haven’t left your home or met a new person in over a year and a half. This book is perfect for a time when we’ve all been forced to reflect, taking stock in what actually matters to us. A year we learned the hard way that we need community more than we ever realized.

When she was twenty-six and broke, Skye didn’t think twice before selling her eggs and happily pocketing the cash. Now approaching forty, Skye still moves through life entirely—and unrepentantly—on her own terms, living out of a suitcase and avoiding all manner of serious relationships. Maybe her junior high classmates weren’t wrong when they voted her “Most Likely to Be Single” instead of “Most Ride-or-Die Homie,” but at least she’s always been free to do as she pleases.

Then a twelve-year-old girl tracks Skye down during one of her brief visits to her hometown of Philadelphia and informs Skye that she’s “her egg.” Skye’s life is thrown into sharp relief and she decides that it might be time to actually try to have a meaningful relationship with another human being. Spoiler alert: It’s not easy.

Things get even more complicated when Skye realizes that the woman she tried and failed to pick up the other day is the girl’s aunt, and now it’s awkward. All the while, her brother is trying to get in touch, her mother is being bewilderingly kind, and the West Philly pool halls and hoagie shops of her youth have been replaced by hipster cafés.

With its endearingly prickly narrator and a cast of characters willing to both challenge her and catch her when she falls, this novel is a clever, moving portrait of a woman and the relationships she thought she could live without.