Sophie Kinsella’s new autobiographical novella What Does It Feel Like? – set to release this fall – will explore the challenges of dealing with grief and celebrate life through all its ups and downs.
According to a press release on the novella’s announcement, What Does it Feel Like? will “follow Eve, a renowned novelist facing a devastating cancer diagnosis and learning to live and love anew.”
According to the publisher, the novella begins when Eve wakes up in the hospital with no memory of how she got there. Her husband explains to her that she had a major surgery to remove the large, malignant tumor growing in her brain. Through Eve’s long recovery, she wrestles with her diagnosis and how to explain it to her children, but also recalls important memories about her husband, her family and everything that’s most important to her.
The novella’s announcement comes after the bestselling author behind Confessions of a Shopaholic revealed her own brain cancer diagnosis in an emotional Instagram post on April 17.
“At the end of 2022 I was diagnosed with glioblastoma, a form of aggressive brain cancer,” Kinsella said in her post. “I did not share this before because I wanted to make sure that my children were able to hear and process the news in privacy and adapt to our ‘new normal.’“
Kinsella also shared that she has been treated at University College Hospital in London and already “had successful surgery and subsequent radiotherapy and chemotherapy, which is still ongoing.”
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Whitney Frick, Editor in Chief of The Dial Press shared that What Does It Feel Like? moved her and “so many of us at Dial and Random House.”
“Sophie’s work paved the way for many of the popular romance writers working today — authors like Emily Henry, Carly Fortune and Annabel Monaghan” Frick said, in the press release. “They, and all of us, will be inspired by Sophie’s grace and courage in the face of a devastating diagnosis.”
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Kinsella also shared that What Does It Feel Like? is her “most autobiographical work to date” and that “Eve’s story is my story.”
“I have always processed my life through writing,” Kinsella explained. “Hiding behind my fictional characters, I have always turned my own life into a narrative. It is my version of therapy, maybe. Writing is my happy place and writing this book, although tough going at times, was immensely satisfying and therapeutic for me.”
What Does it Feel Like? will be released on October 8 through The Dial Press, an imprint of Random House Publishing Group and is available for preorder now, wherever books are sold.
