Reviews

"This novel is singularly difficult to classify. Is it lesbian noir? Slapstick dystopia? Midwestern gothic? To say that it's all of the above is not to exhaust the list of genres Simo straddles and, maybe, invents.... What holds everything together is Simo's inventive and unapologetically irreverent voice... Original, profane, and discomfiting."
—Kirkus Reviews

"This is a book for those who desire a protagonist who will rough them up a bit...How many of us have befriended or slept with people who would be intolerable if they weren't so deliberate, informed, and droll? Heartland takes that sensation and plops it into the pre-apocalypse."
—Sarah Fonseca, Lambda Literary

"Simo's gift lies not only in keeping the reader invested in her narrator's detailed observances and wild tangents, but in her own total fearlessness as a writer... Simo didn't necessarily set out to create a likable character, but a complicated one whose brashness reminds us how our past can ultimately shape who we are and how we relate to the world around us. Heartland is an imperfect, yet pleasing cocktail that goes down unexpectedly smooth; it is truly unlike any novel I can think of, or imagine."
—Juan Vidal, NPR

"Eschewing labels and defying expectations, Simo slyly confronts race, sexuality, multigenerational duty, immigrant dislocation, and even dirty politics while spinning a bizarrely spectacular, outlandishly disorienting (not-)love-story of lost, searching souls."
—Terry Hong, Booklist

"Hilariously absurd and profane."
—N. K. Jemisin, The New York Times Book Review