Best friends Penelope and Alice leave Canada to attend University in Scotland, motivated in part so Pen can try to figure out the secrets she thinks her parents are hiding.
I thought this was written beautifully - capturing the essence of University life, deep friendships and tentative steps into first love. That feeling of being on the cusp of adulthood and discovering more about your parents, your friends, yourself. I think it explores the feeling of invincibility you feel in your youth, but also the consequences of your choices.
Knight’s writing style is lyrical and grounded, I thought it really captured the nuance and made me feel nostalgic for this time in my own life. This is a very character driven novel, and jumps around perspectives and time. I think this is the type of book that may not speak to everyone but it resonated with me. The characters are flawed and authentic. I thought Knight did a great job of capturing a universal experience that is still uniquely personal.
Thank you Viking for the copy through NetGalley!

I soooo enjoyed this debut by Canadian author, Emma Knight that follows two Toronto friends, Pen and Alice, as they embark on their first year of university in Edinburgh. Told over the span of the year, we see Pen and Alice grow together and apart while making new friends, emarking on romantic relationships and as Pen tries to get to the bottom of her parent's divorce by tracking down one of her father's best friends from his time at University in Scotland in the 80s.

This book felt nostalgic in the best ways, was full of female friendship, female empowerment and family secrets. I loved both Pen and Alice's story lines and seeing how they grew as individuals and young women in the early 2000s. The author also explores sexual misconduct through a student-professor affair, infidelity, single motherhood and so much more.

Great on audio narrated by one of the best, Saskia Maarleveld, who does an amazing job voicing the full cast of characters. This was also a Read with Jenna January book club pick and I am so glad she chose an emerging Canadian author who will definitely be one to watch! Many thanks to NetGalley and the publisher for an early digital copy and @prhaudio for a complimentary ALC in exchange for my honest review!

Thank you, NetGalley and PRH, for kindly providing me with an ARC copy of this title.

The Life Cycle of the Common Octopus follows the story of a young Canadian first year university student, Pen, as she attempts to navigate the challenges of moving to a different country for school, friendships, first loves, and the mystery of why her parents saddled her with such a masculine middle name, "Elliot".

The writing style for this book is quite lovely, the prose elegant and refined, and the subject matter wholesome. Although a bit slow to start, I found myself invested at the 1/4 mark. I was highly amused by certain terms of phrase, including "gobblers of aged homes" in reference to molds, moths, and rodent families. I will definitely adopt that term for myself. Overall, I found TLCoTCO a pleasant read, although there were certain writing mechanics that did not jive with me, personally.

In a word, I would have to describe this book as being a tad "disorienting". It very much feels like the makings of a fantastic story, but I feel could very much benefit from more structure and editing. Penelope is the main protagonist, and most chapters follow her perspective and POV. Suddenly at Chapter 15, we abruptly jump to the POV of Pen's best friend Alice without warning, and only return to it a couple of times within the book later. Ultimately, I found these jumps jarring and out of place, particularly because side plot of Alice's love life felt secondary, or even tertiary to the story, and I couldn't find myself caring about her motives and actions, or even desiring her unnecessary POV in the book at all. This happens in a few more latter chapters as well - we get one chapter from a matriarch, and then one from Penelope's father, which just felt disjointed and rather shoehorned in. Although I appreciate the idea of giving context to the story through characters perhaps better equipped to impart plot perspective, I found these jumps discombobulating as they were distributed sparingly throughout the book, and realized halfway through I was starting each chapter by scanning several paragraphs down, just to get the context of who the chapter narrator might be. It just kind of made for anxiety riddled reading at the start of every new chapter as I attempted to orient myself.

Overall though, I found the book heartening, and a relatable slice of life story following what it's like to be away from home for the first time. I do look forward to future projects from this author.

I had one big complaint about reading this title, and it's one that has absolutely nothing to do with the story or author, so Netgalley and/or PenguinRandomhouse Publishing, this note is for you. As someone who mainly reads ARCs on their phone, the formatting for this epub nearly made this book unreadable, and wholly unenjoyable. I am normally a devourer of books, but the font was practically microscopic and there was no way to adjust the settings for the font size, without pinch zooming my way through it, which makes for a scrolling/reading experience akin to skating over a digital ice rink. I'm a millennial in my early 30's, and I'm often delegated the joyous task of verbally imparting ingredient lists from food packaging in size .000001 font to my elderly mother (and can do so without reading glasses). Reading this epub felt very much akin to that. I eventually resorted to jumping through NetGalley's hoops to put this onto my Kobo halfway through the book, but even then the font was puny and hard on the eyes. If I, a reader of decent vision and a non-wearer of glasses struggled so much to read the text, I can't imagine how those who rely on reading glasses must have fared.

There was also no way to change the contrast to my preferred way of reading, which is dark mode. Overall this made for a unpleasant reading experience - I normally devour books in 1 - 2 days... this book took a good while, just based purely on the logistics of trying to read it. Please, please, for the sake of future ARC readers' retinas everywhere, add dark mode and font size adjustment to future ARC epubs! Thank you!

The Life Cycle of the Common Octopus by Canadian author Emma Knight

The brilliant colours on the cover attracted my attention, and title ‘The Life Cycle of the Common Octopus’ drew me in. When Pen and her best friend Alice leave Toronto and go to Scotland to study at University of Edinburgh, I smiled because I have always been intrigued by the countryside and castles of Scotland.

I appreciate Canadian author Emma Knight’s descriptive writing style which made it easy to visualize the characters, and various settings. Christina Lennox and Pen were my favourite characters.

Although the story was a little slow to start, I enjoyed this debut novel about first love, female friendship, motherhood and a mystery surrounding the Lennox family. 3.7 stars rounded up to 4
Triggers: miscarriages and rape

Thanks to #NetGalley and Publisher Penguin Random House Canada for giving me the opportunity to read an advanced digital copy of The Life Cycle of the Common Octopus and share my thoughts of the book.

Penelope arrives in Scotland for University with her best friend, Alice, hopeful for her future and beginning to understand her past. Growing up in Toronto in the shade of her parent's divorce and many secrets, has made her intensely curious for what they are hiding. Knowing that they will not divulge the answers to her questions, she seeks out the answers through an old family friend, one she is named after, Eliot Lennox, who lives in Scotland. Partially a coming-of-age story, and a mystery, The Life Cycle of the Common Octopus is an intriguing debut novel by Emma Knight.

There are a lot of elements to like about this book - the characters are well written and interesting, especially the Lennox family. The narrative jumps around quite a bit, from Penelope's point of view to her best friend Alice's, and even some of the Lennox's. While it is essential for following the flow of the story, it at times can feel jumpy and as a reader I was not always sure who were meant to root for and understand. There were elements of the story that felt like filler, and could have done without. The core of my interest was the mystery of the Lennox family and how that related to Penelope's parents, and if there had been more focus on this aspect of the title, I might have enjoyed the story a little bit more. Another piece of confusion is the title, as this book has nothing to do with the Octopus and I saw another reviewer connect the title to Remarkably Bright Creatures, which admittedly is what caught my eye to the cover as well.

Overall a well written debut, and an author I would be interested in reading more from but not a story that stands out as much among other similar titles.

So, when we get to the meaning of the title, I liked all of that. Very clever and insightful.
Here are the strengths: Knight is a great writer and she has the skeleton here for an outstanding book.
But there were several things for me that never made sense. The first is that Pen -- and she is surrounded by posh-sounding tired characters -- is 18. She's supposed to be 18! And living in the 20th Century I think? Have you met an 18 year old? I have one in my house and she is nowhere near as self-possessed as Pen seems to be. The way she behaves is like a 25-year-old. Also, does an 18-year-old really care about her father? I mean, really?
In giving us a discussion, at the end, of motherhood and octopi, we really needed more of this throughout the novel. Again, an 18-year-old will not be able to give us, the reader, these wild insights as she is receiving them.
Finally, the omniscient narrator does not work here. We are being given Pen's story, and then we're throwing in these other viewpoints once in a while. Doesn't work.
This feels like, someone had some connections and got a book deal (Heather Reisman was thanked in the acknowledgements???) but we could have used a few more drafts for this one.
I am not sharing this socially. I will give 3 stars, my lowest rating, on Goodreads for it.

This book was slow, and not in a delightful way. In a "wealthy-people-creating-their-own-problems-so-they-have-something-to-do" way. There's supposed to be this intrigue and family mystery but it holds zero tension and is a little all over the place. When you finally get to how the story connects to the title it's through the least likeable character who seems to suddenly have an entire personality change. The connection between story and title seems like a stretch. I didn't hate reading it but did hit a point asking if it was over yet as it takes forever to wrap anything up.

I read a few reviews for this book and was very interested in it, however I did not get into it. It didn't draw me in as other books have before. I appreciate the opportunity to try it out though! Thank you.

A cute story about a girl who leaves her hometown to discover why she shares her middle name with her father's friend. Loved the setting of Edinburgh and enthusiasm of the teenage protagonist as well as the warm family relationships. Didn't get how the booktitle was chosen as it had no bearing on the story. I look forward to reading the author's next book.

Beautifully written and engaging. I actually found myself wanting to know more about what became of all the characters!

What a delightfully smart and enjoyable character-driven read. This coming of age tale follows Penelope as she moves from Canada to Edinburgh as a student and tries to learn more about one of her father's old friends.
I loved how the author weaved different characters' POV throughout, as the story unfolds through Penelope as well as a whole cast of characters (friends, family, etc.). This a very promising debut from Knight and I would definitely read whatever she writes next.

Thank you so much to Net Galley and the publisher for the ARC.

Thank you to the Arc copy from Netgalley and publisher. I was excited to get an early copy based on the description of the setting taking place in Ontario, Canada… my home base in the GTA. Although, the plot follows highschool friends that move to Scotland for University, the author provides a well description of where ever the characters are... She captured it with University life, the elite families, train systems, home life and even down to the food enjoyed.

No spoilers, the novel is about a couple of generations and relationships, connections/ family found and lost and found again.

⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

3.5* rounded up

This was a really difficult book to review. I enjoyed reading this story that centres on Penelope, but I struggled with what the point really turned out to be.

In the beginning, there is a clear motive. Penelope’s is the voice we hear the most and she’s interesting. She talks of her family and her studies in Edinburgh. She mentions a letter she writes to an old friend of her father’s out of the blue.

The story tumbles out from there. We get a few chapters from Alice’s point of view too, which I really enjoyed and also helped to fill out the story from all the angles.

It is very character driven and the characters really feel alive and flawed. While we start with Penelope and live mostly in her head, this novel is about her relationship with Alice. They’ve been friends a very long time and their lives have evolved and changed but somehow they keep finding their way back to one another. It’s about womanhood too and finding your place in a world that isn’t really made for you. It’s about family secrets and lies and how our mothers touch and change and mold our lives; whether we want them to or not.

There are so many complex relationships in this slice of life and that’s what kept my interest; how Penelope and her friends make sense of the things that are chaotic so they can grow and move forward.

I wanted more out of the ending. I wanted more detail and depth and answers but not getting those things also felt more real to the story.

The writing was beautiful and a delight to read. I enjoyed reading about these young adults coming into their own.

This is a contemporary tale of family secrets, friendship, young love, infatuation, and motherhood – a whole lot of character-driven themes which combine to make quite a riveting tale. Pen (Penelope) Elliot Winters leaves her Canadian home for a place at Edinburgh University where she spends most of her time with her best friends, Alice, a budding actress and an irrepressible flirt, and Jo who is so unshakably wholesome, she’s good at grounding the trio.

Pen is haunted by the mystery of why her parents lumbered her with the middle name of Elliot. Convinced it has to do with a friendship gone awry between writer Elliot Lennox and her father, she contacts Lennox with hopes of being invited to his home to solve her puzzle. There she meets wife Christina; Sasha, the oldest, graduating from Edinburgh University; troubled, wayward son, Freddie; and their cousin George (Georgina) and her baby Danny. While Jo is pursuing her intellectual calling and Alice is venturing towards sexual disaster, Pen finds herself infatuated with Sasha but is unable to negotiate the mixed messages swirling around him. She can’t always see the forest for the trees.

For this reader the pages flew by as the relationships between thoroughly rounded characters muddle their way through a coming-of-age tale about the anxiety-ridden pitfalls of young love. Recommended for readers who enjoy atypical friend and family relationships which may spark some new thinking.

Thank you for the ARC. Unfortunately, I am unable to give a glowing review. I was just so bored. I didn't feel invested in the characters and quit at the halfway mark because it didn't seem to really be going anywhere (and I had it as a pdf so the font was small).

This is not a great way to start my reading year.

We follow our main protagonist, Penelope, whose middle name is Elliot, which she just doesn't understand as Elliot is typically a boy's name. This bothers 'Pen' so much that she digs into her parents' past and finds a guy called Elliot Lennox, who is now a famous writer. Upon further investigation, she understands that her parents no longer have contact with Elliot, so she takes its upon herself to launch into Elliot Lennox's family to understand why she carries the middle name she does.

If this sounds flimsy to you, I can assure you that it reads flimsy to me also. I wasn't convinced by the plot or the characters here unfortunately. This felt very amateur, almost like a draft.

It also rubbed me up the wrong way in terms of thought processes like a person wearing extremely clean trainers must own a lot of shoes. It feels very elite to me. Also, characters tensing their eyelids, no one can tense their eyelids, let's be real.

The time period of this book is also unknown, with people having to log onto laptops to use messenger to communicate makes me think the book is set decades ago yet it's never made clear which i feel it should do for a 2025 release.

All in all, this was a miss for me.

Two stars (I liked the few sentences on the Octopus)

This was a wonderfully engaging book. I really enjoyed it. The characters were interesting and well developed. The plot was compelling. The “surprise” at the heart of the book was dealt with very well.
The book touched on many relationship issues faced by contemporary women - abuse, power imbalance, undeserved gossip, unfulfilled marriages, good marriages and young love. And the book resolves all this issues in a satisfactory manner.
I highly recommend this book.

Starting the year strong, I finished The Life Cycle of the Common Octopus this afternoon and loved it. To be honest, I didn't want to put it down once I started. I loved the characters (two Canadians studying in Edinburgh). It was a compelling story of a young woman's quest to find out about the person she is named after.

Her father had attended the University of Edinburgh and befriended a Scottish fellow, and there was a history between him and the family. I won't spoil it, but it was a great read. I loved the characters (although I'm sure a bit stereotypical - the aloof novelist, his doting (and life-maintaining) wife, their two sons (one an angel, the other a devil)... the Scottish highland.

A few side stores of co-eds' antics in their first year at college (including a scoundrel of a prof.). It was somewhat predictable, but the final plot twist was not something I saw coming.

All in all, it is a great book to read. I would happily recommend it.

I would like to express my gratitude to NetGalley and the publisher for providing me with a free electronic ARC of this novel in exchange for an honest review.

Such a lovely book!
Pen and Alice, best friends leave Toronto, Canada to go to Scotland to attend university. Pen is a inspiring journalist and Alice an aspiring actor. Pen’s parents have ended their marriage and Pen questions the reasons behind it. Why is her middle name Elliot? What is the connection to Lord Lennox her father’s friend from the past? The mystery that unfolds is very well written and all characters were well defined in their roles.
The title of the story and how it ties into motherhood from two characters in the book Margot and Christina was very insightful and how they had different views on what being a mother entailed.

A story about friendship, motherhood, young love and family secrets.
The book cover and title drew me to read this book.

I would happily recommend it.

I would like to express my gratitude to NetGalley and the publisher for providing me with a free electronic ARC of this novel in exchange for an honest review.

Wow - i loved this book! What a way to start my year of reading!

This is a beautiful story that despite focusing on a narrow slice of life of Penelope (Pen) and Alice, best of friends from Toronto abroad in Scotland for their first year of university studies, tackles an incredible variety of issues and themes.

From attending classes to weekend jaunts to country estates and boys (and men) there’s a lot going on. And yet it almost always comes back to the role and place of women and more particularly mothers (but also daughters) within a tight web of expectation and lived experience.

Highly recommend.