Kiley Reid

A striking debut novel from an exhilarating new voice, Such a Fun Age is a story about race and privilege, set around a young black babysitter, her well-intentioned employer, and a surprising connection between them that threatens to undo them both. Alix Chamberlain is a woman who gets what she wants and has made a living showing other women how to do the same. A mom to two small girls, she started out as a blogger and has quickly built herself into a confidence-driven brand. She and her company, LetHer Speak, are a fixture on the working-mom-slash-CEO circuit. So, she is shocked when her babysitter, Emira Tucker, is confronted while watching the Chamberlain's toddler one night. Seeing a young black woman with a white child out late at night, a security guard at their local high-end supermarket accuses Emira of kidnapping two-year-old Briar. A small crowd gathers, a bystander films everything, and Emira is furious and humiliated. Alix resolves to make it right. But Emira herself is aimless, broke, and wary of Alix's desire to help. At twenty-five, she is about to lose her health insurance, and has no idea what to do with her life. When the video of Emira unearths someone from Alix's past, both women find themselves on a crash course that will upend everything they think they know about themselves, and each other. With big-hearted empathy and piercing social commentary, Such a Fun Age is a story for our times, unearthing the stickiness of transactional relationships, the complicated reality of being a "grown up," and the consequences of doing the right thing for the wrong reasons.

Such a Fun Age

Amelia Stephens

“I just think it would be best if we went our separate ways and... that those paths never like... came back together"

Briar is so ADORABLE I can't stop smiling.

Iara Figueira

“You all done?” Alix asked Briar, who nodded with her mouth still full, and Alix set her on the floor.

“Mama?” Briar ambled over to Catherine. She swiped her sister’s blond hair across her forehead, and Catherine beamed. “How does feathers get wet?”

“Umm, in the rain?” Alix said. “Or when birds take a bath? Let’s be gentle with baby sis.”

“But how—because . . . the feathers is . . . how the feathers get wet and fly away?”

“Bri, look.” Alix picked up a pink ball from a bin of toys and tossed it down the hall. Briar gasped, overjoyed, and dutifully pumped her arms as she went running after it.

Zara had two sisters, one of whom struggled with anorexia, and the other with depression, two conditions that Emira’s mother believed black people didn’t “get.” 

“Nooo! Not the Halloween party at Lulu’s!”

Emira laughed. “I brought my cat ears and everything. It just pissed me off that she didn’t want to talk to her kid and made her miss a party because of it.”

“Well, any mom who misses the chance to dress her kid up like a hot dog sounds like a psychopath to me.”

Such a Fun Age quotes

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