Making It

Making It

Laura Kay

Enjoyment: Quality: Characters: Plot:

From the author of Wild Things comes a heartwarming and relatable queer rom-com about an isolated young woman whose artistic celebration of her pet chinchilla suddenly launches her into the professional art world, reality TV fame, and first love. Isobel's life is just her, her mum, and her pet chinchilla, Abigail, in their council flat on the Kentish coast. After mental health troubles in her teens, Issy, now twenty-eight, has kept things that way on purpose, only deviating from routine when her part-time job at a paint-your-own pottery studio demands it, or when she's inspired to create art of knitted Abigails, sculptural Abigails, delicately rendered paintings of Abigail. When the Abigails earn the attention of famous artist and reality TV star Elizabeth Staggs, Issy is awestruck and a little alarmed. These emotions compound when Elizabeth makes Issy an unexpected move to London and work for a year shadowing Elizabeth as she produces her hit arts documentary series. Terrified but determined, Issy agrees, and soon finds herself sharing a flat with a crew of boisterous roommates who welcome her into their queer enclave and attempt to mentor her in the city's wide world of romantic possibilities. Issy can't help but wish that one roommate—gorgeous and cool aspiring actress, Robin—might make her mentorship a bit more hands on...even while, at work, she struggles under the guidance of Elizabeth's harsh and exacting young producer, Aubrey. But when Elizabeth seizes on Issy's idea to structure the upcoming season around a group of outsider artists, Issy finds both her work and love lives growing more complicated by the day, whether she's ready or not. Making It is a nuanced and life affirming look at living with depression and of finding, as we all deserve to, self-acceptance, community, and love.


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  • sapphic.library
    Mar 25, 2025
    Enjoyment: Quality: Characters: Plot:

    MAKING IT is a heartfelt and relatable story about isobel "issy" bailey, a girl whose life consists of her part-time job at a pottery studio, her mom, and her pet chinchilla, abigail, and the art she makes of abigail. when elizabeth staggs, a famous artist whose work issy loves, shows up at her house and offers her a job in london, issy packs up her life and abigail's cage and moves into a flat in london with three quirky roommates. moving to a new city is no small feat, and issy attempts to balance her depression along with her new job working with elizabeth, her burgeoning crush on her roommate robin, and life in a new city. 

    while i didn't immediately connect with issy and her story, the more i read, the more i related to her struggles and anxieties. beyond a romance novel, this is a story about mental health, identity and community, and i found it so heartwarming and emotional. issy was a very realistic heroine—she was kind of a mess in a lot of ways, she fucked up, she struggled, but that made her all the more relatable to me because she was deeply human. i loved seeing how her relationships with her roommates and her friends developed, how she found herself and became more comfortable with who she was, and how she grew throughout the course of the book.

    read if you like:
    - found family
    - mental health rep
    - pet chinchillas

    thanks to netgalley and vintage for the advanced copy! MAKING IT comes out july 2nd.

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