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Offseason
A blisteringly funny and transcendently deranged debut novel following a young woman who takes a job at an all-girls boarding school in a small coastal town to teach English literature—and to try, desperately, to escape the trap that is herself.
In Avigayl Sharp’s brilliant and bold debut novel, Offseason, our fiercely observant but self-deluded narrator finds herself teaching at an all-girls boarding school on the Eastern Seaboard. In between manic lectures that veer from Charles Dickens’s Bleak House to the childhood maltreatment of her beloved Iosif Stalin and the generational legacy of the Holocaust, she consorts and canoodles with the town’s locals—including the possibly disgraced male teacher whose job she’s taken over—implicating everyone she meets in her obsessive quest to pin down where, exactly, her own life went wrong.
Though she's vowed never to return to her hometown in the middle of the country, the holiday season sends her careening back into the orbit of her overbearing, maladjusted family. Drunk at a bar on the frigid afternoon of the seventh night of Chanukah, she encounters the figure from her adolescence who may or may not be responsible for violating her, bringing her down, and ruining her life. The past collides with the present—but catharsis and closure are nowhere to be found. Not at the bar. Not in her childhood home. And certainly not in the unruly spirals of her mind.
Serious yet irreverent with a delirious velocity, Offseason reimagines the conversation around trauma while reckoning with the doomed project of “speaking your truth,” the compulsion to repeat, and whether we can be transformed by art and love.
In Avigayl Sharp’s brilliant and bold debut novel, Offseason, our fiercely observant but self-deluded narrator finds herself teaching at an all-girls boarding school on the Eastern Seaboard. In between manic lectures that veer from Charles Dickens’s Bleak House to the childhood maltreatment of her beloved Iosif Stalin and the generational legacy of the Holocaust, she consorts and canoodles with the town’s locals—including the possibly disgraced male teacher whose job she’s taken over—implicating everyone she meets in her obsessive quest to pin down where, exactly, her own life went wrong.
Though she's vowed never to return to her hometown in the middle of the country, the holiday season sends her careening back into the orbit of her overbearing, maladjusted family. Drunk at a bar on the frigid afternoon of the seventh night of Chanukah, she encounters the figure from her adolescence who may or may not be responsible for violating her, bringing her down, and ruining her life. The past collides with the present—but catharsis and closure are nowhere to be found. Not at the bar. Not in her childhood home. And certainly not in the unruly spirals of her mind.
Serious yet irreverent with a delirious velocity, Offseason reimagines the conversation around trauma while reckoning with the doomed project of “speaking your truth,” the compulsion to repeat, and whether we can be transformed by art and love.
304 pages, Hardcover
First published May 5, 2026
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 88 reviews
June 1, 2026
Avigayl Sharp’s debut novel channels The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie to shape her unsettling play on weird girl lit. Sharp’s unnamed protagonist is 28, an awkward mix of jaded and extremely anxious. Adrift after abruptly quitting grad school, she’s taken a temporary job teaching English literature at an obscure girls’ boarding school in a remote coastal town. Everything around her seems disturbingly off-kilter, even the sea air’s layered with a stench of rotting meat. She views the townspeople as hostile shoring up her sense other people are “fundamentally malevolent.” Her new pupils are equally uneasy, sent here for so-called challenging behaviour. Like Miss Brodie, the narrator’s teaching showcases her own obsessions. Sharp’s first-person narrator intermingles Dickens’s Bleak House with its vision of nightmarish bureaucracy and unfulfilled dreams with a personal fixation on Stalin – his troubled childhood, his overlooked vulnerabilities. It’s an uncomfortable feat of misdirection given Stalin’s infamous persecution of Jews and her mother’s heritage tracing back to Vilnius’s Jewish communities. But the narrator’s strategy suggests she’s siding with Stalin rather than his victims to evade shadows cast by intergenerational trauma.
Although trauma saturates her narrative, Sharp’s novel isn’t so much about trauma as deliberately highlighting trauma-centred lit’s limitations, its well-worn tropes and tired conventions. The narrator’s tendency to dwell on the grotesque, seeping bodily fluids, and all things scatological inevitably conjures Moshfegh but also gestures towards Portnoy’s Complaint deftly undermining Philip Roth’s influence on Jewish American fiction, his take on themes around identity and neurosis, his pointedly masculine perspective. Sharp touches on overlapping issues but she also uses her narrator’s experiences to explore the transformatory potential of literature particularly for fractured, uncertain characters like the ones depicted here – her narrative's peppered with references to writers including Kafka and Nabokov. Her narrator’s cynicism, her tendency to look for the corrupt or perverted highlights Sharp’s interest in how seeing harm everywhere might itself cause harm.
It’s tempting to label Sharp’s book as autobiographical. But Sharp’s clear that while there may be resemblances – her mother’s background’s similar to the narrator’s – there are also drastic departures. She may, for instance, have worked in a school but not as a teacher. Overall, it’s a clever, inventive piece. The plot’s minimal but the narrator’s voice is persuasive, often wonderfully wry and bleakly comical. But, for me, it’s a little too long – spending time inside the narrator’s head could be exhausting.
Thanks to Netgalley and publisher Orion for an ARC
Rating: 3.5
Although trauma saturates her narrative, Sharp’s novel isn’t so much about trauma as deliberately highlighting trauma-centred lit’s limitations, its well-worn tropes and tired conventions. The narrator’s tendency to dwell on the grotesque, seeping bodily fluids, and all things scatological inevitably conjures Moshfegh but also gestures towards Portnoy’s Complaint deftly undermining Philip Roth’s influence on Jewish American fiction, his take on themes around identity and neurosis, his pointedly masculine perspective. Sharp touches on overlapping issues but she also uses her narrator’s experiences to explore the transformatory potential of literature particularly for fractured, uncertain characters like the ones depicted here – her narrative's peppered with references to writers including Kafka and Nabokov. Her narrator’s cynicism, her tendency to look for the corrupt or perverted highlights Sharp’s interest in how seeing harm everywhere might itself cause harm.
It’s tempting to label Sharp’s book as autobiographical. But Sharp’s clear that while there may be resemblances – her mother’s background’s similar to the narrator’s – there are also drastic departures. She may, for instance, have worked in a school but not as a teacher. Overall, it’s a clever, inventive piece. The plot’s minimal but the narrator’s voice is persuasive, often wonderfully wry and bleakly comical. But, for me, it’s a little too long – spending time inside the narrator’s head could be exhausting.
Thanks to Netgalley and publisher Orion for an ARC
Rating: 3.5
March 10, 2026
If Selin, the protagonist of Elif Batuman’s The Idiot, instead of being a naive, idealistic, anxious Harvard freshman, was instead a 28 year-old English literature grad program dropout, recently post-romantic breakup, at the nadir of the severest Quarterlife Crisis Self-Loathing, with an bad Adderall addiction and an unhealthy, bordering on Stockholm Syndrome obsession with IOSIF (iykyk) Vissarionovich Stalin — plus, her whole narrative had been written not in the style of The Idiot, but rather more in that of Ducks, Newburyport, or for that matter, Virginia Woolf if she had just read the oeuvre of Ottessa Moshfegh, and if Moshfegh’s protagonist of My Year of Rest and Relaxation had just dropped out of grad school, moved to the country, and obtained a new ill-advised job Guiding the Youth before deciding to spend a year in a drug-addled haze — then we might have something like this book.
(I’ve promised myself to stop referencing both Ducks, Newburyport and Ottessa Moshfegh in my reviews, but this won’t be the time.)
But to quote Moshfegh’s My Year of Rest and Relaxation: “Education is directly proportional to anxiety,” and indeed, Offseason, which I would label as Interior Dark (Comedic) Academia, may best be appreciated by readers like myself who have spent some time in grad school, whether successfully or not, particularly for literature or philosophy, but anywhere in the liberal arts and humanities realm, and belatedly or not so belatedly realized that this was likely the worst environment in the world for them, like total raging Inner Demons Fuel. As my first high school boyfriend told me when he broke up with me, in a remark that was devastating at the time but likely prescient, “You think too much.”
The unnamed narrator of Offseason certainly thinks too much, mostly delusionally by this point, as she ships herself off to self-imposed exile on an eastern US seaboard island to teach at a mid-level girls’ boarding school, like Jane Eyre’s cousin with a bad Eeyore complex. Instead of fleeing Lowood, but for some similar reasons, she is fleeing her Chicago family home, where she has recently crash-landed post-crisis after having sworn that ever to do so would constitute a fate worse than death. Unlike Jane, the narrator is not an orphan, although she seems to believe she may as well be, but rather is the daughter of a Russian-speaking Jewish mother, who immigrated from Soviet Lithuania and is prone to rapid emotional vicissitudes, and a father who is sort of on Mildly Anxious Hovering Management Standby Mode. (And a sister who is an MMA fighter.) There is also a mysterious ex who seems to be her most secure tether to reality and hope, as evidenced by his ability to have remained in the grad program from which she has, with equal mystery, ejected.
“Offseason” is such an appropriate title for this narrative, because during this lost, shut-down period of her life, our narrator spends a weird two semesters in stasis at this weird little old school suspended on an inherently weird little tourist island that is even weirder and more bleak during this closed-down and inclement period of the calendar, when even the loyal vagrants who’ve summered on its streets for a decade have peaced out for the time being. In this reedy and rickety, wind-scoured and shuttered setting, the narrator’s sense of self-sabotage or lack of insight or both compel her to teach a most discordant course that she labels The Literature of the City and whose syllabus was written in the space of twenty minutes and consists solely of reading Charles Dickens’s Bleak House for the entire school year — a decision that is received just as enthusiastically as you’d expect by the small and motley crew of junior high school girls rendered into her care.
This book, as many reviews will doubtless say, is NOT for everyone. But, I found it absolutely hilarious, every line. Sure, the comedy is extremely dark and disturbing, soaring to new heights of unreliable narration and, as our narrator is increasingly lost in the swirling smoggy funk of her own imaginations, fueled as they are by “Methamphetamine’s Cousin,” becoming super cringey to an almost unbearable pain point. Yet, there is that steady if bleakest humor to get you through, and some very faint traces of relatability, empathy, and even hope surface as we watch to see if she will be able to emerge into the rustlings of a more fruitful and bustling new season.
I really did love this one and feel grateful and vindicated that it has also been praised by writers as different and respected as Catherine Lacey, Michael Chabon, Elizabeth McCracken, and Jessica Anthony. A very unique and funny read that I hope does not get thoughtlessly lumped into the lazy categorization of Sad Girl Lit and whose unusual humor I hope does not go undetected. A beach read for recovering failed would-be academics everywhere! My thanks to NetGalley, the author, and Astra Publishing House for the ARC of Offseason, due out on May 5, 2026.
(I’ve promised myself to stop referencing both Ducks, Newburyport and Ottessa Moshfegh in my reviews, but this won’t be the time.)
But to quote Moshfegh’s My Year of Rest and Relaxation: “Education is directly proportional to anxiety,” and indeed, Offseason, which I would label as Interior Dark (Comedic) Academia, may best be appreciated by readers like myself who have spent some time in grad school, whether successfully or not, particularly for literature or philosophy, but anywhere in the liberal arts and humanities realm, and belatedly or not so belatedly realized that this was likely the worst environment in the world for them, like total raging Inner Demons Fuel. As my first high school boyfriend told me when he broke up with me, in a remark that was devastating at the time but likely prescient, “You think too much.”
The unnamed narrator of Offseason certainly thinks too much, mostly delusionally by this point, as she ships herself off to self-imposed exile on an eastern US seaboard island to teach at a mid-level girls’ boarding school, like Jane Eyre’s cousin with a bad Eeyore complex. Instead of fleeing Lowood, but for some similar reasons, she is fleeing her Chicago family home, where she has recently crash-landed post-crisis after having sworn that ever to do so would constitute a fate worse than death. Unlike Jane, the narrator is not an orphan, although she seems to believe she may as well be, but rather is the daughter of a Russian-speaking Jewish mother, who immigrated from Soviet Lithuania and is prone to rapid emotional vicissitudes, and a father who is sort of on Mildly Anxious Hovering Management Standby Mode. (And a sister who is an MMA fighter.) There is also a mysterious ex who seems to be her most secure tether to reality and hope, as evidenced by his ability to have remained in the grad program from which she has, with equal mystery, ejected.
“Offseason” is such an appropriate title for this narrative, because during this lost, shut-down period of her life, our narrator spends a weird two semesters in stasis at this weird little old school suspended on an inherently weird little tourist island that is even weirder and more bleak during this closed-down and inclement period of the calendar, when even the loyal vagrants who’ve summered on its streets for a decade have peaced out for the time being. In this reedy and rickety, wind-scoured and shuttered setting, the narrator’s sense of self-sabotage or lack of insight or both compel her to teach a most discordant course that she labels The Literature of the City and whose syllabus was written in the space of twenty minutes and consists solely of reading Charles Dickens’s Bleak House for the entire school year — a decision that is received just as enthusiastically as you’d expect by the small and motley crew of junior high school girls rendered into her care.
This book, as many reviews will doubtless say, is NOT for everyone. But, I found it absolutely hilarious, every line. Sure, the comedy is extremely dark and disturbing, soaring to new heights of unreliable narration and, as our narrator is increasingly lost in the swirling smoggy funk of her own imaginations, fueled as they are by “Methamphetamine’s Cousin,” becoming super cringey to an almost unbearable pain point. Yet, there is that steady if bleakest humor to get you through, and some very faint traces of relatability, empathy, and even hope surface as we watch to see if she will be able to emerge into the rustlings of a more fruitful and bustling new season.
I really did love this one and feel grateful and vindicated that it has also been praised by writers as different and respected as Catherine Lacey, Michael Chabon, Elizabeth McCracken, and Jessica Anthony. A very unique and funny read that I hope does not get thoughtlessly lumped into the lazy categorization of Sad Girl Lit and whose unusual humor I hope does not go undetected. A beach read for recovering failed would-be academics everywhere! My thanks to NetGalley, the author, and Astra Publishing House for the ARC of Offseason, due out on May 5, 2026.
December 9, 2025
Offseason is one of those rare novels that grabs you instantly and doesn’t let go. I flew through it. Not just because the writing is sharp and propulsive, but because the protagonist is so bizarrely, brilliantly herself.
The story follows a young woman who moves to a small town on the Eastern Seaboard for a short-term teaching job at a private academy. Instead of the fresh start she imagines, the isolation and strangeness of the off-season campus push her deeper into her own obsessive inner world. She fixates on the Holocaust, her family’s knot of trans-generational trauma, Stalin, pedophiles - dark, thorny subjects that in another novel might weigh things down. Here, they become part of a voice so incisive and unexpectedly funny that I found myself laughing out loud at moments that should, by all logic, be grim.
What I loved most is how the book balances emotional discomfort with wicked humor. Her intellectual rabbit holes don’t feel like quirks for color, they’re the exact machinery through which she tries (and often fails) to make sense of her own anxiety, history, and desire. It’s unsettling, illuminating, and deeply human.
The pacing is electric, the voice unforgettable, and the blend of seriousness and comedy is pulled off with a precision that feels effortless. I finished it wishing I could read it again for the first time.
If you like fiction that’s strange, smart, unflinching, and genuinely funny, Offseason is a knockout.
5⭐️
Thanks to NetGalley and Astra House for the eARC in exchange for an honest review.
The story follows a young woman who moves to a small town on the Eastern Seaboard for a short-term teaching job at a private academy. Instead of the fresh start she imagines, the isolation and strangeness of the off-season campus push her deeper into her own obsessive inner world. She fixates on the Holocaust, her family’s knot of trans-generational trauma, Stalin, pedophiles - dark, thorny subjects that in another novel might weigh things down. Here, they become part of a voice so incisive and unexpectedly funny that I found myself laughing out loud at moments that should, by all logic, be grim.
What I loved most is how the book balances emotional discomfort with wicked humor. Her intellectual rabbit holes don’t feel like quirks for color, they’re the exact machinery through which she tries (and often fails) to make sense of her own anxiety, history, and desire. It’s unsettling, illuminating, and deeply human.
The pacing is electric, the voice unforgettable, and the blend of seriousness and comedy is pulled off with a precision that feels effortless. I finished it wishing I could read it again for the first time.
If you like fiction that’s strange, smart, unflinching, and genuinely funny, Offseason is a knockout.
5⭐️
Thanks to NetGalley and Astra House for the eARC in exchange for an honest review.
March 22, 2026
If what appeals to you about this book is a story about a woman finding herself through the eyes of her students while teaching at a girls’ school, I would suggest a reread of The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie instead. Don’t come for the plot, come for the vibes (the vibes being Fleabag meets early Moshfegh).
This book is being compared to The Idiot for good reason, which is that the narrator fully immerses you in her point of view, at its gnarliest, most tangential, and most irreverent. Personally, I love this kind of POV, but I know it’s not for everyone.
Bonus points for an unhealthy sexualized obsession with a problematic (and dead) historical figure (if you enjoyed the Freud obsession in Jessica Gross’s Hysteria, you’ll go crazy for the Stalin obsession in Offseason).
Negative points for really laying on thick (and often!) the difference between pedophiles and ephebophiles, which while semantically correct, makes my stomach churn (a year ago I might not have been so nauseous about this distinction—thanks, Megyn Kelly and every bro podcaster for this).
Thank you to NetGalley & Astra House for the arc!
This book is being compared to The Idiot for good reason, which is that the narrator fully immerses you in her point of view, at its gnarliest, most tangential, and most irreverent. Personally, I love this kind of POV, but I know it’s not for everyone.
Bonus points for an unhealthy sexualized obsession with a problematic (and dead) historical figure (if you enjoyed the Freud obsession in Jessica Gross’s Hysteria, you’ll go crazy for the Stalin obsession in Offseason).
Negative points for really laying on thick (and often!) the difference between pedophiles and ephebophiles, which while semantically correct, makes my stomach churn (a year ago I might not have been so nauseous about this distinction—thanks, Megyn Kelly and every bro podcaster for this).
Thank you to NetGalley & Astra House for the arc!
Review of advance copy received from Netgalley
If this story were a texture, it would be sticky to the touch and you'd wonder if the residue was candy or vomit.
As the name "Offseason" suggests, the novel takes place in a kind of in-between state, a bridge between what has happened and what is going to happen for our main character. The FMC is a bizarre woman who is fully herself, and in the novel we explore what she believes has 'violated her, brought her down, and ruined her life'. The story has observant meanderings about life, generational trauma, rape, ephebophilia, and 'Hot' Stalin, while also being disgusting (which I mean in the most complimentary way).
I heavily annotated my e-copy, and could easily see myself revisting this story again in the future for both laughs and meaningful insights on life. Thank you NetGalley and Astra House for the eARC in exchange for an honest review!
As the name "Offseason" suggests, the novel takes place in a kind of in-between state, a bridge between what has happened and what is going to happen for our main character. The FMC is a bizarre woman who is fully herself, and in the novel we explore what she believes has 'violated her, brought her down, and ruined her life'. The story has observant meanderings about life, generational trauma, rape, ephebophilia, and 'Hot' Stalin, while also being disgusting (which I mean in the most complimentary way).
I heavily annotated my e-copy, and could easily see myself revisting this story again in the future for both laughs and meaningful insights on life. Thank you NetGalley and Astra House for the eARC in exchange for an honest review!
May 24, 2026
This felt fresh and very self-assured for a debut novel. I laughed a lot, even though the main character's story is not funny at all.
The first person narrator is a brilliant, manic and unhinged 28-year old woman. She has come to a desolate American tourist town in the off-season, to teach English literature at an academy. But she has also come to deal with the traumas of her past, taking a distance from her neurotic Jewish mother and her relationship. And she is all too open to talk about these traumas to whoever will listen - including in class to her students.
Despite the deadpan voice in which the novel is told, it manages to be moving at times. But as it progressed I also found myself wondering if it would not have worked better as a short story.
The first person narrator is a brilliant, manic and unhinged 28-year old woman. She has come to a desolate American tourist town in the off-season, to teach English literature at an academy. But she has also come to deal with the traumas of her past, taking a distance from her neurotic Jewish mother and her relationship. And she is all too open to talk about these traumas to whoever will listen - including in class to her students.
Despite the deadpan voice in which the novel is told, it manages to be moving at times. But as it progressed I also found myself wondering if it would not have worked better as a short story.
May 4, 2026
2.5
this started out good but i very quickly lost interest
this started out good but i very quickly lost interest
May 17, 2026
What a bizarrely divine book. The entire time I was reading, I felt like I was trapped in a damp, dark room. The central plot of “Offseason” by Avigayl Sharp is a little loose, following a young woman as she begins a new temporary teaching job at a young women’s boarding school. Beyond that, there are events that occur, but this book really shines while we are stuck in the narrators thoughts, or as I’d refer to it: a cabinet of offensive curiosities. She gives her sprawling insight on various hyperfixations such as: young (and hot) Stalin, pedophilia vs. ebophilia, what makes people attractive, generational religious trauma, interest in her students personal lives, and more. I do want to make the distinction, that while there are topics that seem “offensive,” Sharp tackles them in a way that is refreshing, hilarious, or vulnerable. Yes, middle-aged white man comedian, it can be done! You can talk about offensive things without being offensive!
We learn more about her through dropped and fragmented details. It seems like to get to the real “meat” of the character, you have to sift through a lot of chaotic musings. But, it is so great to unwind everything and put the pieces together. You’ll learn everything about seemingly nothing, but almost nothing about what should be the everything.
Also, the tone of this book alone has kept it locked in my brain. I’m already eager to get a print copy, re-read it, and annotate the shit out of it. I didn’t know a book could be so unsettlingly refreshing.
Thank you so much to Astra House and Netgalley for the ARC in exchange for a fair and honest review.
We learn more about her through dropped and fragmented details. It seems like to get to the real “meat” of the character, you have to sift through a lot of chaotic musings. But, it is so great to unwind everything and put the pieces together. You’ll learn everything about seemingly nothing, but almost nothing about what should be the everything.
Also, the tone of this book alone has kept it locked in my brain. I’m already eager to get a print copy, re-read it, and annotate the shit out of it. I didn’t know a book could be so unsettlingly refreshing.
Thank you so much to Astra House and Netgalley for the ARC in exchange for a fair and honest review.
November 15, 2025
Thanks to Netgalley and Astra House for the ebook. We follow a young woman who gets a last minute gig to teach at an all girls school in New England. In a time where you would never make students read a long novel, she assigns Dicken’s nearly thousand page Bleak House (one student later asks her, Can’t you tell we’re just pretending to have read it?). And then while teaching she constantly talks about pedophiles, the miserable upbringing of Stalin, who is a favorite of hers, and her family’s personal history of the Holocaust. She’s such a fascinating character. She seems to enjoy talking to one of the town’s transients, who never remembers her later, than anyone else. She thinks the teacher she’s replacing for the year may have had an inappropriate relationship with one of the students and then starts an affair with him. She swears she’ll never go home again and then goes home Christmas break and goes out to a bar and starts making out with a childhood acquaintance who she says abused her and ruined her life. It’s not always clear what to believe, but it’s amazing to be in her head as she’s constantly full of praise and apologies to everyone she meets, but so blisteringly mean and inappropriate in her thoughts.
Review of advance copy received from Netgalley
This book was All Fours by Miranda July meets The Coin by Yasmin Zaher, perfect for lovers of girl-messes in literature. I really enjoyed this book. It's one that you really have to give your full attention to in order to fully sink into the prose, brilliantly written by Avigayl Sharp. The novel is very humorous in a way where you're not entirely sure if you should be laughing, but the ridiculousness of everything out of the FMC's mouth had me chuckling out loud several times. I especially think Sharp excels at writing when her characters are telling anecdotes to each other- these stories within the main narrative structure are insane and take so many strange turns. I would definitely recommend this to lovers of weird women in fiction.
Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for the ARC in exchange for an honest review.
Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for the ARC in exchange for an honest review.
May 26, 2026
I get the comparisons to Elif Batuman’s The Idiot because I had similar experiences reading both. Offseason grabbed me from the beginning with what is a VERY strong voice. The protagonist who narrated the novel in first person is strange and damaged and at times deeply offensive (complimentary). Her obsession with young Joseph Stalin is laugh-out-loud dark humor, as are many other scenes. I love how she refers to her ADHD meds exclusively as “methamphetamine’s cousin” and to the traumatic incident from her past in equally obscure terms, because the very act of naming something gives it a power that cannot be taken back. I love how matter-of-fact and unsentimental she is about trauma, as if it is a banal and inevitable white noise buzzing constantly, neither consuming entirely nor fading away. To quote Sartre: “a creeping pain that gnaws and fumbles and caresses one and never hurts quite enough.”
All of that is to say. There is so much that I loved about this book, so much that I found exciting. And yet, I found myself growing bored inside the protagonist’s head, found myself wanting to skim walls of internal monologue, found myself wanting it to be over. Such brilliance to be found, but such an uneven reading experience. I’m eager to see what Sharp does next.
All of that is to say. There is so much that I loved about this book, so much that I found exciting. And yet, I found myself growing bored inside the protagonist’s head, found myself wanting to skim walls of internal monologue, found myself wanting it to be over. Such brilliance to be found, but such an uneven reading experience. I’m eager to see what Sharp does next.
May 10, 2026
The debut authors are just nailing it for me this year. I’m adding so many new authors to my “read everything they write” list and Avigayl Sharp is officially added. This one is weird girl with some unhinged lines (all of which I highlighted while reading, of course). But it’s written in a more subdued, almost meditative way. It’s so smart and funny.
The obsession with hot Stalin and her family’s traumatic history? The ephebophile thing, which while correct, is just icky? The way she just stood there free bleeding, like what. 😭 This one doesn’t hold back from talking about the touchy subjects. In fact, it kind of dives in headfirst. I had no idea what was going to come out of this character’s mouth or what she was going to do next and I was cracking up.
Offseason is 100% vibes-based over plot-based, and that works perfectly fine for me because I’m a vibes-based reader. This book had all the vibes I expected and knew it would have from the cover.
The obsession with hot Stalin and her family’s traumatic history? The ephebophile thing, which while correct, is just icky? The way she just stood there free bleeding, like what. 😭 This one doesn’t hold back from talking about the touchy subjects. In fact, it kind of dives in headfirst. I had no idea what was going to come out of this character’s mouth or what she was going to do next and I was cracking up.
Offseason is 100% vibes-based over plot-based, and that works perfectly fine for me because I’m a vibes-based reader. This book had all the vibes I expected and knew it would have from the cover.
May 24, 2026
gross girl/mean-llenial+campus novel+book by book lover about book lover little jaunt through an academic year with one of the most idiosyncratic, self obsessed, and yet sweetly sincere narrator I’ve read in a hot minute. If you’re not yet tired of Cline and Moshfegh and Clark I’d say give it a go but don’t expect a plot or really any satisfaction.
Very well written on a sentence level.
Very well written on a sentence level.
April 16, 2026
Yes. This book was made for me. I love my girlies unhinged and uncomfy. Thank you Astra House for my early copy!
February 27, 2026
Thank you to NetGalley, Astra Publishing House, and Avigayle Sharp for my very first ARC!
I loved this book. It won’t be for everyone — and that’s fine. It’s one of those “nothing happens” in a dramatic sense, but somehow everything happens, you know? The action is almost entirely internal.
The main character has a somewhat romantic obsession with a young, 'misunderstood' Joseph (I mean Iosif) Stalin. She's worried about her possibly depressed psychiatrist offing himself. She constantly spirals into strange, funny internal monologues about important things and also things that are not. (Who knew people could be so passionate about the different kinds of -philes?)
Hilarious, witty, brilliant. Offseason is entertaining, beautifully written, and deep. Amazing debut! One of my favorites to kick off 2026.
TL;DR - funny, absurd, self-aware, very original. If you like Fleabag you'll love this.
I loved this book. It won’t be for everyone — and that’s fine. It’s one of those “nothing happens” in a dramatic sense, but somehow everything happens, you know? The action is almost entirely internal.
The main character has a somewhat romantic obsession with a young, 'misunderstood' Joseph (I mean Iosif) Stalin. She's worried about her possibly depressed psychiatrist offing himself. She constantly spirals into strange, funny internal monologues about important things and also things that are not. (Who knew people could be so passionate about the different kinds of -philes?)
Hilarious, witty, brilliant. Offseason is entertaining, beautifully written, and deep. Amazing debut! One of my favorites to kick off 2026.
TL;DR - funny, absurd, self-aware, very original. If you like Fleabag you'll love this.
June 5, 2026
Gosh I think I don’t like this in the same way I don’t love Elif Batuman’s work because it often makes me uncomfortable and is weird in a way that doesn’t cause contemplation for myself personally but rather boredom and confusion.
May 5, 2026
This will appeal to readers wanting an unhinged narrator and ambiguous plot. I was initially captivated by the narrator’s musings/rantings but I lost some of that interest somewhere near the halfway point. There are moments of brilliance and deliciously dark humor.
Thank you to Astra House and NetGalley for the opportunity to read a copy.
Thank you to Astra House and NetGalley for the opportunity to read a copy.
Want to Read
January 23, 2026Everyone is raving... I fear I am too easily influenced
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May 13, 2026
Offseason is the kind of book that works by accumulation. Avigayl Sharp's narrator is a PhD dropout turned boarding school teacher, deposited in a small coastal town in its quiet months, between tourist seasons, between destinations, between versions of herself she can't quite name. The prose matches her: long, winding sentences that glance through hard ideas and keep moving, sometimes honest, sometimes ironic, always observant.
The title refers to the town's offseason, its emptiness without tourists. It refers to something else too. Highly recommended for patient readers who like their fiction patient, sharp, and a little bit lost.
The narrator believes she sees everything clearly. Her parents ruined her life. Her students are filed and categorized within pages. She is detached from most of what surrounds her, and she would tell you that detachment is just accuracy. The book quietly, consistently disagrees.
This reminded me of Kafka's The Castle in texture rather than plot: a meander through life, relatively hopeless, sustained by the quality of noticing rather than by arrival at anything. The observations are harsh and frequently very funny, which is a harder balance to strike than it looks. Sharp never tips into mean. The narrator is indicting a world she's also trapped inside, and that keeps her company rather than pushing you away.
There is a moment near the end involving a red bird that crashes into a window. The narrator sees it, does nothing, moves on. Later she thinks she glimpses it being nursed back to health by a neighborhood family. It turns out to be a gaming console. It's bleak and fitting and says more about this narrator than almost anything else in the book. She is the bird. The hope is always a screen.
Stalin comes up more than you'd expect. Get used to it.
The title refers to the town's offseason, its emptiness without tourists. It refers to something else too. Highly recommended for patient readers who like their fiction patient, sharp, and a little bit lost.
The narrator believes she sees everything clearly. Her parents ruined her life. Her students are filed and categorized within pages. She is detached from most of what surrounds her, and she would tell you that detachment is just accuracy. The book quietly, consistently disagrees.
This reminded me of Kafka's The Castle in texture rather than plot: a meander through life, relatively hopeless, sustained by the quality of noticing rather than by arrival at anything. The observations are harsh and frequently very funny, which is a harder balance to strike than it looks. Sharp never tips into mean. The narrator is indicting a world she's also trapped inside, and that keeps her company rather than pushing you away.
There is a moment near the end involving a red bird that crashes into a window. The narrator sees it, does nothing, moves on. Later she thinks she glimpses it being nursed back to health by a neighborhood family. It turns out to be a gaming console. It's bleak and fitting and says more about this narrator than almost anything else in the book. She is the bird. The hope is always a screen.
Stalin comes up more than you'd expect. Get used to it.
May 28, 2026
This was really funny, mostly because the narrator moves through social situations so badly. She circles around themes like:
- Her crush on Iosif Stalin
- Her view that every adult male has ephebophilia and it's therefore overlooked relative to pedophilia
- Her drive to have an orgasm-with-partner
- Eating disorders
and brings them up at completely inappropriate times. I also loved the descriptions of her teaching, how she'd turn around and write random phrases on the board, set a 900 page book and have students ask why other classes read 4, the random outbursts from students. GREAT.
The scene where she goes back home is excellent, how they speak past each other but increasingly intensely. She brings up the comment about washing her vagina with too much soap as a child hahaha.
I didn't really get her relationship to Thomas or the boy from grad school, but I guess that's the point. She was so alienated from her own sexuality. The scene where she half heartedly tries to seduce the cleaner.
I liked the writing otherwise. She sometimes rattles off a long list of 10-30 things to describe something, but it works so well because they're all very well observed. I also likes how she zeroes in on disgust in certain situations, a lot of vomit/sick and then in the final scene the sweatiness in the hall.
I wasn't that into the fever dream/unreliable narrator stuff. It worked well enough, but I sometimes lost what was/wasn't real, particularly with her mum. I'm sure that was the point. I also found it difficult to know who the characters were.. small things to tidy up in future books.
Overall I loved how fresh and brisk it was. No prisoners. Looking forward to reading/hearing other reviews of this because I'm not quite sure what to make of it, all in all.
- Her crush on Iosif Stalin
- Her view that every adult male has ephebophilia and it's therefore overlooked relative to pedophilia
- Her drive to have an orgasm-with-partner
- Eating disorders
and brings them up at completely inappropriate times. I also loved the descriptions of her teaching, how she'd turn around and write random phrases on the board, set a 900 page book and have students ask why other classes read 4, the random outbursts from students. GREAT.
The scene where she goes back home is excellent, how they speak past each other but increasingly intensely. She brings up the comment about washing her vagina with too much soap as a child hahaha.
I didn't really get her relationship to Thomas or the boy from grad school, but I guess that's the point. She was so alienated from her own sexuality. The scene where she half heartedly tries to seduce the cleaner.
I liked the writing otherwise. She sometimes rattles off a long list of 10-30 things to describe something, but it works so well because they're all very well observed. I also likes how she zeroes in on disgust in certain situations, a lot of vomit/sick and then in the final scene the sweatiness in the hall.
I wasn't that into the fever dream/unreliable narrator stuff. It worked well enough, but I sometimes lost what was/wasn't real, particularly with her mum. I'm sure that was the point. I also found it difficult to know who the characters were.. small things to tidy up in future books.
Overall I loved how fresh and brisk it was. No prisoners. Looking forward to reading/hearing other reviews of this because I'm not quite sure what to make of it, all in all.
Read
June 8, 2026The writing was excellent, but I fear I didn’t really get the point of this novel. Maybe there wasn’t really a point at all, but in this case, I can’t stand ambiguity. Especially because it was long enough to have some sort of meaning besides generational and internalized trauma. I read a review that said this would’ve worked better as a short story and I completely agree because the middle dragged on a bit and the protagonist’s inner monologue is so dense that it felt hard to parse the meanings between each moment. I did like how it felt grimy and sticky, like dirt you can’t get out from under your fingernails or just residue on the kitchen counter from god knows what.
February 16, 2026
The Fiona DG Story
June 8, 2026
A very weird book...the protagonist is wild
May 24, 2026
I enjoyed the experience of reading this, mainly because of the narrator’s unique and very readable voice (all three stars are for style), but I really have no clue what the point of anything was other than a vague overarching gesture to “trauma, am I rite?” Feels like I need to read it a second time to piece together all the echoes and callbacks to itself to fully get it, and one day I just might. A very mastubatory book (sometimes literally), and I don’t mean that entirely negatively.
April 13, 2026
I don't think I will ever tire of the weird girl genre. It always brings something unexpected, uncomfortable, and a little unnerving, which are three of my favorite things to experience when I'm reading. Offseason is the perfect example of all of the above.
Although it was not a plot driven book, and not necessarily a character study either, I was never bored. In fact, it was the opposite. I felt drawn to this weird tale of our protagonist's journey through a school year and her one-of-a-kind interactions with those in her purview. Avigayl Sharp's distinctive writing style was so enchanting and strange that it was hard to look away.
I'd recommend Offseason to all the weirdos out there looking for full of an absorbing oddity that will stick with you long after its over.
Thank you to NetGalley and Astra House for an Advance Reader Copy in exchange for an honest review.
Although it was not a plot driven book, and not necessarily a character study either, I was never bored. In fact, it was the opposite. I felt drawn to this weird tale of our protagonist's journey through a school year and her one-of-a-kind interactions with those in her purview. Avigayl Sharp's distinctive writing style was so enchanting and strange that it was hard to look away.
I'd recommend Offseason to all the weirdos out there looking for full of an absorbing oddity that will stick with you long after its over.
Thank you to NetGalley and Astra House for an Advance Reader Copy in exchange for an honest review.
Review of advance copy received from Netgalley
(1.5/5)
eARC provided by Netgalley in exhange for an honest review.
I've recently read Sharp's short stories, and enjoyed most of them, which was what motivated me to request this arc. It's interesting to see how her favorite themes web and evolve through her writing. This novel has quite a few similarities to her other work, but where before the narrative flowed well and seemed consistent and realistic, Offseason crashes and burns.
I tried my best to give this a fair chance, even as I've slowly become disillusioned with what people call "Sad Girl Literature." I think that's a disgusting term, but I can't think of another thing to call this subgenre that, by all regards, Sharp fits perfectly well into. Offseason has themes that I've become familiar with after reading Moshfegh, Broder, and other contemporaries. But Sharp lacks the imagination and refinement to make them work. There is no subtlety in this book. One or two passages are funny, some function appropriately well as character development, but none of it is really convincing, and none of it sticks. The narrator is a simple compilation of edgy traits that are meant to portray her loss of seemingly every mannerism and opinion a normal human being would have, but it is so extreme that she becomes a caricature of herself.
Being inside her head is exhausting. For a long time I couldn't read more than a page without sighing and closing my kindle. Think of the most negative and cynical person you know: I imagine this is what the inside of their head must sound like, and it is harrowing to be in it.
But it's not just that's the narrator is fatalistic—it's that everything about this book seems lazy and hastily thrown together. It's got a strong concept, some interesting side characters (Thomas and Cordelia), and I think it could work in a different context, but it is a drag to read. The style is nothing impressive, and Sharp uses narrative tools which are basic and predictable. I feel like I've read this novel before, but now it's screaming in my face and banging a drum next to my ears and it won't let me rest.
No character behaves normally. Sharp exaggerates and stretches beyond the realm of belief. No action or thought process goes where it should; nothing in this really makes any kind of sense. And it's not in a unreliable narrator—drugged up daze—manic episode way. It's in the author's choice of words and sentence structures. It's seeped into the fabric of the story itself, and it's impossible to scrub clean.
eARC provided by Netgalley in exhange for an honest review.
I've recently read Sharp's short stories, and enjoyed most of them, which was what motivated me to request this arc. It's interesting to see how her favorite themes web and evolve through her writing. This novel has quite a few similarities to her other work, but where before the narrative flowed well and seemed consistent and realistic, Offseason crashes and burns.
I tried my best to give this a fair chance, even as I've slowly become disillusioned with what people call "Sad Girl Literature." I think that's a disgusting term, but I can't think of another thing to call this subgenre that, by all regards, Sharp fits perfectly well into. Offseason has themes that I've become familiar with after reading Moshfegh, Broder, and other contemporaries. But Sharp lacks the imagination and refinement to make them work. There is no subtlety in this book. One or two passages are funny, some function appropriately well as character development, but none of it is really convincing, and none of it sticks. The narrator is a simple compilation of edgy traits that are meant to portray her loss of seemingly every mannerism and opinion a normal human being would have, but it is so extreme that she becomes a caricature of herself.
Being inside her head is exhausting. For a long time I couldn't read more than a page without sighing and closing my kindle. Think of the most negative and cynical person you know: I imagine this is what the inside of their head must sound like, and it is harrowing to be in it.
But it's not just that's the narrator is fatalistic—it's that everything about this book seems lazy and hastily thrown together. It's got a strong concept, some interesting side characters (Thomas and Cordelia), and I think it could work in a different context, but it is a drag to read. The style is nothing impressive, and Sharp uses narrative tools which are basic and predictable. I feel like I've read this novel before, but now it's screaming in my face and banging a drum next to my ears and it won't let me rest.
No character behaves normally. Sharp exaggerates and stretches beyond the realm of belief. No action or thought process goes where it should; nothing in this really makes any kind of sense. And it's not in a unreliable narrator—drugged up daze—manic episode way. It's in the author's choice of words and sentence structures. It's seeped into the fabric of the story itself, and it's impossible to scrub clean.
Read
October 23, 2025Really not for me, but I see the appeal. The narration is really interesting insular and isolated and that’s also reflected in how they perceive the world, which is cool. Not really dark academia vibes if that’s important to you. Dark New England vibes for sure though.
May 29, 2026
ITA
Il personaggio principale, di cui non importa il nome e, quindi, non è noto, ci porta con sé in questo romanzo. Sta viaggiando verso una località sull’oceano per fare supplenza come insegnante di letteratura inglese in un collegio femminile.
Tutto il romanzo è raccontato in prima persona. A volte ci vengono raccontati dei dialoghi, per la maggior parte del romanzo ci troviamo nella mente del personaggio principale in una sorta di “stream of consciousness".
Quello che traspare dalla storia è che la nostra eroina ha subito una violenza, da ragazza, che le ha rovinato la vita, ha dei rapporti conflittuali in famiglia con la madre in modo particolare, la cui famiglia è stata vittima dell’Olocausto, un rapporto, direi, deviato con la sorella maggiore e, molto probabilmente, un disturbo alimentare.
E infine ha una adorazione/ossessione per Stalin.
Un romanzo che scorre lento, non è chiarissimo il passare del tempo se non in qualche punto, tra pensieri ricorsivi e ossessivi del personaggio principale che ha bisogno di continuare a parlare della violenza che avrebbe subito, dell’olocausto, di Stalin, a volte si parla di alcuni aspetti di alcuni rapporti, tratteggiati, senza una introduzione prima, senza spiegazione.
Ci sono dei punti che ho trovato più interessanti di altri. Il primo quando torna a casa durante le vacanze natalizie. Lo scontro con la madre; da ubriaca in un pub, l’incontro con il “mostro” del passato, la confessione della violenza del passato a un’altra persona, anche questa ubriaca, e la consapevolezza che per la prima volta qualcuno abbia avuto una reazione proporzionata a quello che lei raccontava.
Molto belle anche le descrizioni, tratteggiate, dei posti e delle persone, che trasmettono sensazioni più che un'immagine, una fotografia.
Ultimo punto, più di scrittura, i discorsi diretti non hanno la punteggiatura classica, però almeno si capisce che sta accadendo un dialogo.
Ho ricevuto una copia gratuita. Questa recensione contiene la mia opinione ed è pubblicata liberamente.
ENG
The main character, whose name is irrelevant and therefore unknown, draws us into this novel. She is traveling to a seaside town to work as a substitute English literature teacher at a girls’ boarding school.
The entire novel is narrated in the first person. While some dialogue is included, for most of the novel we are inside the main character’s mind in a sort of “stream of consciousness.”
What emerges from the story is that our heroine suffered an act of violence as a girl that ruined her life; she has conflicted relationships within her family, particularly with her mother, whose family was a victim of the Holocaust; a relationship with her older sister that I would describe as strained; and, most likely, an eating disorder.
And finally, she has an adoration/obsession with Stalin.
The novel moves slowly; the passage of time isn’t very distinct except at certain points, amid the main character’s recurring and obsessive thoughts: she needs to keep talking about the violence she allegedly suffered, the Holocaust, and Stalin. At times, the narrative touches on aspects of certain relationships, sketched out without prior introduction or explanation.
There are certain parts I found more interesting than others. The first is when she returns home for the Christmas holidays. The confrontation with her mother; getting drunk in a pub, the encounter with the “monster” from her past, confessing the past violence to another person—who is also drunk—and the realization that, for the first time, someone had a reaction that was proportional to what she was telling them.
The sketchy descriptions of places and people are also very picturesque; they convey sensations rather than an image or a photograph.
One final point, more about the writing: the direct speech lacks standard punctuation, but at least you can tell that a dialogue is taking place.
I received an advance review copy for free, and I am leaving this review voluntarily.
Il personaggio principale, di cui non importa il nome e, quindi, non è noto, ci porta con sé in questo romanzo. Sta viaggiando verso una località sull’oceano per fare supplenza come insegnante di letteratura inglese in un collegio femminile.
Tutto il romanzo è raccontato in prima persona. A volte ci vengono raccontati dei dialoghi, per la maggior parte del romanzo ci troviamo nella mente del personaggio principale in una sorta di “stream of consciousness".
Quello che traspare dalla storia è che la nostra eroina ha subito una violenza, da ragazza, che le ha rovinato la vita, ha dei rapporti conflittuali in famiglia con la madre in modo particolare, la cui famiglia è stata vittima dell’Olocausto, un rapporto, direi, deviato con la sorella maggiore e, molto probabilmente, un disturbo alimentare.
E infine ha una adorazione/ossessione per Stalin.
Un romanzo che scorre lento, non è chiarissimo il passare del tempo se non in qualche punto, tra pensieri ricorsivi e ossessivi del personaggio principale che ha bisogno di continuare a parlare della violenza che avrebbe subito, dell’olocausto, di Stalin, a volte si parla di alcuni aspetti di alcuni rapporti, tratteggiati, senza una introduzione prima, senza spiegazione.
Ci sono dei punti che ho trovato più interessanti di altri. Il primo quando torna a casa durante le vacanze natalizie. Lo scontro con la madre; da ubriaca in un pub, l’incontro con il “mostro” del passato, la confessione della violenza del passato a un’altra persona, anche questa ubriaca, e la consapevolezza che per la prima volta qualcuno abbia avuto una reazione proporzionata a quello che lei raccontava.
Molto belle anche le descrizioni, tratteggiate, dei posti e delle persone, che trasmettono sensazioni più che un'immagine, una fotografia.
Ultimo punto, più di scrittura, i discorsi diretti non hanno la punteggiatura classica, però almeno si capisce che sta accadendo un dialogo.
Ho ricevuto una copia gratuita. Questa recensione contiene la mia opinione ed è pubblicata liberamente.
ENG
The main character, whose name is irrelevant and therefore unknown, draws us into this novel. She is traveling to a seaside town to work as a substitute English literature teacher at a girls’ boarding school.
The entire novel is narrated in the first person. While some dialogue is included, for most of the novel we are inside the main character’s mind in a sort of “stream of consciousness.”
What emerges from the story is that our heroine suffered an act of violence as a girl that ruined her life; she has conflicted relationships within her family, particularly with her mother, whose family was a victim of the Holocaust; a relationship with her older sister that I would describe as strained; and, most likely, an eating disorder.
And finally, she has an adoration/obsession with Stalin.
The novel moves slowly; the passage of time isn’t very distinct except at certain points, amid the main character’s recurring and obsessive thoughts: she needs to keep talking about the violence she allegedly suffered, the Holocaust, and Stalin. At times, the narrative touches on aspects of certain relationships, sketched out without prior introduction or explanation.
There are certain parts I found more interesting than others. The first is when she returns home for the Christmas holidays. The confrontation with her mother; getting drunk in a pub, the encounter with the “monster” from her past, confessing the past violence to another person—who is also drunk—and the realization that, for the first time, someone had a reaction that was proportional to what she was telling them.
The sketchy descriptions of places and people are also very picturesque; they convey sensations rather than an image or a photograph.
One final point, more about the writing: the direct speech lacks standard punctuation, but at least you can tell that a dialogue is taking place.
I received an advance review copy for free, and I am leaving this review voluntarily.
Review of advance copy received from NetGalley
A ballsy and exceptional debut, in which 'debut' clearly does not mean junior in any way. Phenomenal writing, daring and confident; beautiful prose painting a vivid picture of a chaotic time spent in limbo.
I am not embarrassed to admit what I don't know, and there are many things still that I know of by name exclusively. Yes, Freud, weird sexual ideas about parents, but that's as far as I got before reading Offseason. So I'm having a great time with novels like this, that inspire me to look into all the works they appear to be referencing. And with Offseason, there are plenty.
Let me start by saying if you seek a clear plot, you will not find it here. If you enjoy being provoked and thrown around so you can come back and pick things apart later, this will serve you well. With a work like this I enjoy emptying entire highlighters on its pages, scribbling a million "-?"s in its margins, and unleashing a troop of tabs to take post all over it. A cartography of confusion that might suddenly reveal a key to reading everything, a quest I felt the text definitely rewarded me for.
In Offseason, our main character uses everything in her power - and everyone that crosses her path - to explain why her life was ruined, and she along with it. From projection through her students to wielding Freud's controversial theory of psychosexual development as both sword and shield, her narration is as incisively observant as it is completely deluded and detached from reality. Every next person she meets is assessed for their potential to progress her goal, in a string of bizarre social encounters and fever-dream scenarios where she consistently overshares, projects, misreads and obsesses over her poor misunderstood baby Iosif Stalin.
It all culminates in a monologue - interrupted, apparently having been given before the exact same way to the exact same person - that clarified what I'd been picking up and threw another wrench into my plans to come away with some conviction about what really happened. That almost robotic repetition found in several places, of unnatural sounding phrases and descriptions like 'sexually frigid, incapable of orgasm-with-partner' ended up having the interesting effect of quantifying the presence and space taken up by trauma carried around, and how messy and weird it makes us look.
Icky, unnerving, darkly hilarious and remarkably well written, perhaps not for everyone, but thankfully it found its way to me.
Review of advance copy received from NetGalley
⚠️‼️ Content warning:
Several graphic descriptions of disordered eating behavior, including graphic descriptions of vomiting, and many mentions of sexual assault and child predators. Though I must say - and I don't know how to say this without sounding wrong - I am very sensitive about both vomiting and SA, and I didn't find the mentions of these subjects in the book 'heavy' or emotionally draining. Rape is yapped about relentlessly, as are pedophilia and ephebophilia, and I find that very important to disclose but must also add that they are mostly discussed as concepts, not detailed in sickening scenes.
I am not embarrassed to admit what I don't know, and there are many things still that I know of by name exclusively. Yes, Freud, weird sexual ideas about parents, but that's as far as I got before reading Offseason. So I'm having a great time with novels like this, that inspire me to look into all the works they appear to be referencing. And with Offseason, there are plenty.
Let me start by saying if you seek a clear plot, you will not find it here. If you enjoy being provoked and thrown around so you can come back and pick things apart later, this will serve you well. With a work like this I enjoy emptying entire highlighters on its pages, scribbling a million "-?"s in its margins, and unleashing a troop of tabs to take post all over it. A cartography of confusion that might suddenly reveal a key to reading everything, a quest I felt the text definitely rewarded me for.
In Offseason, our main character uses everything in her power - and everyone that crosses her path - to explain why her life was ruined, and she along with it. From projection through her students to wielding Freud's controversial theory of psychosexual development as both sword and shield, her narration is as incisively observant as it is completely deluded and detached from reality. Every next person she meets is assessed for their potential to progress her goal, in a string of bizarre social encounters and fever-dream scenarios where she consistently overshares, projects, misreads and obsesses over her poor misunderstood baby Iosif Stalin.
It all culminates in a monologue - interrupted, apparently having been given before the exact same way to the exact same person - that clarified what I'd been picking up and threw another wrench into my plans to come away with some conviction about what really happened. That almost robotic repetition found in several places, of unnatural sounding phrases and descriptions like 'sexually frigid, incapable of orgasm-with-partner' ended up having the interesting effect of quantifying the presence and space taken up by trauma carried around, and how messy and weird it makes us look.
Icky, unnerving, darkly hilarious and remarkably well written, perhaps not for everyone, but thankfully it found its way to me.
Review of advance copy received from NetGalley
May 25, 2026
When Sharpe’s novel opens, a twenty-eight year old unnamed narrator is moving into faculty housing at a seasonal coastal town to teach English literature at an all-girls boarding school. She had been living with her parents in her childhood home in a “city in the middle of the country” for the past six months after inexplicably dropping out of a PhD program and leaving behind her boyfriend and their two roommates. She “was grateful to have an income, health insurance, and a reason to move away from the city in which my father, mother, and sister lived.”
The narrator takes a double dose of her “prescribed amphetamine stimulant” to teach her first day of class because she knew, based upon reviews that she had received when she taught an undergraduate course, that she was a horrible teacher who was prone to rambling digressions about her personal life and the childhood maltreatment of Joseph Stalin at the hands of his alcoholic father. She thinks that her students are “idiots, frauds, and liars,” (although she tells the Dean that she was “struck by their exemplary attention spans, their profound intellectual curiosity, the crystalline quality of their minds”). She also thinks that her students wore makeup designed to make them “look like wet babies with brain problems” and, thus, sexually attractive to men. She teaches a single novel, Dickens’ “Bleak House,” over the course of a year.
The narrator befriends the locals, including Billy and Linda, unhoused crack addicts, and fantasizes about Mr. Nelson, the teacher whom she was replacing while he was on an unspecified leave of absence. Convinced that she knows more about the world than anyone else, she is certain that Mr. Nelson was “a rapacious ephebophile” (adults with sexual interest in mid-to-late adolescents) who had taken advantage of a student who was grieving the suicide of her father but, nevertheless, she sleeps with him occasionally. Through her interactions with her colleagues and the students at the Academy, the narrator’s idiosyncratic worldview comes into focus.
The narrator has a volatile relationship with the truth, and concedes that she had a childhood compulsion to lie. She believes that her parents were ultimately responsible for “all the things that had violated me, brought me down, and ruined my life.” Yet, her sister considers their parents “her very best friends,” is concerned about the direction of the narrator’s life and concludes that the narrator “was biologically off-balance, mean spirited, and mentally ill.” The narrator states that she is a “sexually frigid person,” a condition which she attributes to an experience that she had as a seventeen year old virgin in Benjamin Leichter’s parents’ bedroom. The reader never learns what exactly happened; however, the narrator spends an evening at a bar with Leichter and his friend when she returns to her parents’ home during winter break and does not seem to be a woman struggling with the lingering effects of trauma.
Sharp has crafted a darkly intelligent and hilarious campus novel. It is unlike anything that I have read. At bottom, the novel reflects a belief in the transformative power of literature. Thank you Astra House and Net Galley for an advance copy of this debut novel. I eagerly anticipate Sharpe’s next project.
The narrator takes a double dose of her “prescribed amphetamine stimulant” to teach her first day of class because she knew, based upon reviews that she had received when she taught an undergraduate course, that she was a horrible teacher who was prone to rambling digressions about her personal life and the childhood maltreatment of Joseph Stalin at the hands of his alcoholic father. She thinks that her students are “idiots, frauds, and liars,” (although she tells the Dean that she was “struck by their exemplary attention spans, their profound intellectual curiosity, the crystalline quality of their minds”). She also thinks that her students wore makeup designed to make them “look like wet babies with brain problems” and, thus, sexually attractive to men. She teaches a single novel, Dickens’ “Bleak House,” over the course of a year.
The narrator befriends the locals, including Billy and Linda, unhoused crack addicts, and fantasizes about Mr. Nelson, the teacher whom she was replacing while he was on an unspecified leave of absence. Convinced that she knows more about the world than anyone else, she is certain that Mr. Nelson was “a rapacious ephebophile” (adults with sexual interest in mid-to-late adolescents) who had taken advantage of a student who was grieving the suicide of her father but, nevertheless, she sleeps with him occasionally. Through her interactions with her colleagues and the students at the Academy, the narrator’s idiosyncratic worldview comes into focus.
The narrator has a volatile relationship with the truth, and concedes that she had a childhood compulsion to lie. She believes that her parents were ultimately responsible for “all the things that had violated me, brought me down, and ruined my life.” Yet, her sister considers their parents “her very best friends,” is concerned about the direction of the narrator’s life and concludes that the narrator “was biologically off-balance, mean spirited, and mentally ill.” The narrator states that she is a “sexually frigid person,” a condition which she attributes to an experience that she had as a seventeen year old virgin in Benjamin Leichter’s parents’ bedroom. The reader never learns what exactly happened; however, the narrator spends an evening at a bar with Leichter and his friend when she returns to her parents’ home during winter break and does not seem to be a woman struggling with the lingering effects of trauma.
Sharp has crafted a darkly intelligent and hilarious campus novel. It is unlike anything that I have read. At bottom, the novel reflects a belief in the transformative power of literature. Thank you Astra House and Net Galley for an advance copy of this debut novel. I eagerly anticipate Sharpe’s next project.
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