Book Thoughts: Come and Get It by Kiley Reid

I loved Reid's bestselling debut, Such A Fun Age. Can her second novel hit the same sweet spot?

When a debut does unexpectedly well, the author’s second novel is often referred to as “the tricky second”. The idea being that when the author writes their first feted book, they did not know that it would be feted. Further to that, they weren’t writing it having already published a feted book. They were, in short, in blissful ignorance. No expectations. Most of the time, no hype.

When you are following up a hit, however, the hype can be feverish. (Perhaps unsurprisingly, of the authors I’ve interviewed who had a hit with their fourth, fifth or eighth book (Bernadine Evaristo!), they express gratitude and relief and joy, even, that they got to write their first clutch of books relatively incognito.) Such is the case for Kiley Reid’s 2019 Booker-nominated novel, Such A Fun Age. We’re talking hype. Feverish hype.