Stay Where I Can See You
“Delicately observed, utterly gripping.”
— Globe and Mail
“A fine piece of storytelling from one of Toronto’s most versatile writers.”
— Toronto Star
“Onstad’s fast-paced, emotionally engaging novel will strike a familiar chord with readers. It’s a story that will resonate long after they finish reading the book.”
— Winnipeg Free Press
“In this propulsive novel, Katrina Onstad shows us a family touched by love, luck and pain. Her flawed yet compassionate characters grapple with questions of privilege and trauma and the enduring effects of the past on the present. It’s a dramatic and thought-provoking story that testifies to the power of empathy. ”
— Alix Ohlin, Scotiabank Giller Prize shortlisted author of Dual Citizens
“Stay Where I Can See You is compulsively readable, a tense but compassionate meditation on what happens when secrets kept for ‘the right reasons’ begin to poison a happy family from within.”
— Lynn Coady, Scotiabank Giller Prize winner and author of Watching You Without Me
“As much of a page-turner as it is full of insight, Onstad’d novel navigates the uneasy intersection of wealth and class. With her incisive eye, Onstad takes a deeply empathetic look at how girls become women.”
— Claire Cameron, author of The Last Neanderthal
“I loved every page of this gutsy, gorgeously written novel about the dark heart of motherhood and the true cost of trying to leave the past behind.”
— Lisa Gabriele, author of The Winters
Katrina in conversation with Shelagh Rogers on CBC’s The Next Chapter
An interview with Katrina in The Globe and Mail
The Weekend Effect
“Thoughtful, life affirming”
— Globe & Mail
“Too often we race through the week, only to find our weekends packed with countless errands and never-ending to-do lists. Before we know it, we’ve lost sight of what really makes us happy. In The Weekend Effect, Katrina Onstad offers a powerful argument and practical advice on the importance of reclaiming your leisure time to live a happier and more fulfilling life.”
— Gretchen Rubin, New York Times bestselling author of The Happiness Project and Better Than Before
“The history of weekends & capitalism”
— Quartz (edited excerpt)
“In our frenetic era of total work devotion and breathless busyness, the idea of making time for leisure has become almost a sacrilege. But Katrina Onstad makes a compelling case in her terrific new book, The Weekend Effect, that true leisure—time for reflection, connection, play, and joy—knits together the social fabric of community, soothes the weary soul, and, at heart, is what makes life worth living. A welcome romp of a read.”
— Brigid Schulte, New York Times bestselling author of Overwhelmed: Work, Love, and Play When No One Has the Time and director of The Better Life Lab at New America
“Brilliantly chronicles the birth, death and revival of the weekend”
— Success.com
“Too often work and technology erode our ability to connect meaningfully face-to-face, intruding into the critical time we need to recharge ourselves. In Katrina Onstad’s insightful and compelling book, The Weekend Effect, she offers an urgent call to arms on the essential need to take back our weekends.”
— Dallas Hartwig, New York Times bestselling coauthor of It Starts with Food and The Whole 30
“Who killed the weekend?”
— The Guardian
Everybody Has Everything
“Crisp, gripping and deeply thought-provoking.“
— Library Journal (Starred Review)
“Onstad’s radiant novel is powered by gorgeous writing, a quietly propulsive plot, and an uncannily accurate rendering of the way love, lust, rage, and reconciliation ebb and flow in the life of a couple.”
— Real Simple
“Utterly rich, vivid and filled with urgency. I couldn’t take my eyes off of these characters.”
— Kaui Hart Hemmings, author of The Descendants
“A keen eye for details of the contemporary good life…a delicious read.”
— Carol Anshaw, author of Carry the One
“Tenderly observed and elegantly drawn, Onstad’s characters are true to the deep worries and tangential shifts of fate which often define modern life; they remind us of that life’s ability to soothe, to hurt, and to heal.”
— Vincent Lam, Giller Prize-winning author of Bloodletting and Miraculous Cures and The Headmaster’s Wager
How Happy To Be
“Onstad’s book resides on a literary plane of its own. It is scorching, self-hating and dark — like Sam Lipsyte’s work, or Martin Amis’s — and powerful in its ability to drum up emotion (in this regard she leaves the above mentioned writers in the dust).”
— Lauren Mechling, Medium, “The Best Book You’ve Never Heard Of”
“Pop culture geeks will go nuts for Onstad’s brutal dissection of the life of a media whore. . . . A triumph.”
— NOW Magazine
“Katrina Onstad’s How Happy to Be is an acerbic, hilarious and culturally astute page-turner of a debut.”
— Flare
“Young women will relate profoundly and personally . . . . A working woman’s Nick Hornby, Onstad has created a pithy, poppy text about being adrift.”
— Globe and Mail