Brooklyn Thomas has problems. Her heart has stopped beating. And, as worrisome as that is, she’s still physically functioning so she decides to deal with more pressing issues. Like recovering from burnout from her marketing career, where she endured serial misogyny and the insult of co-workers who got paid more to do less.

Having quit her marketing job, Brooklyn is now working for minimum wage at the Cute Li’l Doughnuterie, and has moved into the basement of her parents’ house under a low-key cloud of shame—especially in comparison to her hostile, know-it-all brother Spencer, who is enrolled in med school.

Worst of all, Brooklyn is grappling with ambiguous grief, because her best friend Penny has been missing for the last year. While she was on an overseas humanitarian mission in a war-torn country, Penny disappeared. Without any evidence of whether she is alive or dead, Brooklyn lives in an in-between land of hope and despair.

In response to her troubles, she begins hallucinating dead TV show starlets who give advice and urge her to put her life back together. Yet when loneliness and failure threaten to overwhelm, in walks the sweet and affable Henry, and Brooklyn is smitten. Her mad crush also seems to have feelings for her. But it’s complicated, Henry is in a relationship already.

Although Brooklyn’s problems initially feel like separate issues all piling on at the same time, they begin to intersect. Her musings about her plight are philosophical, vulnerable and deeply emotional. She also has an excoriatingly hilarious point-of-view on the ironies and inanities of modern life and popular culture.  

Brooklyn Thomas Isn’t Here is a cri de coeur for all women who have experienced a betrayal of the body—that always seem to come at times when life is already throwing down the greatest hurdles. Brooklyn’s story is utterly relatable, as so many women relegate their health to the backburner—ignoring the root causes to simply keep going—yet always at their peril. Ultimately, Brooklyn’s literally broken heart is a wise metaphor: If we don’t face our past and come to terms with our present, we won’t have the capacity to love.

Alli Vail is appearing on stage in the Literary Cabaret with the band West Coast Front, Friday, October 18. Tickets are on sale now.

Review is by Rebecca Wood Barrett. Barrett is a filmmaker and writer living in Whistler, BC. Her children’s chapter book My Best Friend is Extinct won the Chocolate Lily Book award, and her follow-up book My Summer Camp has Mega Sloths will publish in May 2025 with Orca Book Publishers.