{"id":20509,"date":"2026-03-27T07:00:02","date_gmt":"2026-03-27T11:00:02","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.cemeterydance.com\/extras\/?p=20509"},"modified":"2026-02-22T20:41:24","modified_gmt":"2026-02-23T01:41:24","slug":"review-decomposition-book","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.cemeterydance.com\/extras\/review-decomposition-book\/","title":{"rendered":"Review: Decomposition Book by Sara Van Os"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><strong><img data-recalc-dims=\"1\" loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" data-attachment-id=\"20508\" data-permalink=\"https:\/\/www.cemeterydance.com\/extras\/review-decomposition-book\/decomposition-book\/\" data-orig-file=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.cemeterydance.com\/extras\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/02\/decomposition-book.jpg?fit=791%2C1200&amp;ssl=1\" data-orig-size=\"791,1200\" data-comments-opened=\"1\" data-image-meta=\"{&quot;aperture&quot;:&quot;0&quot;,&quot;credit&quot;:&quot;&quot;,&quot;camera&quot;:&quot;&quot;,&quot;caption&quot;:&quot;&quot;,&quot;created_timestamp&quot;:&quot;0&quot;,&quot;copyright&quot;:&quot;&quot;,&quot;focal_length&quot;:&quot;0&quot;,&quot;iso&quot;:&quot;0&quot;,&quot;shutter_speed&quot;:&quot;0&quot;,&quot;title&quot;:&quot;&quot;,&quot;orientation&quot;:&quot;0&quot;}\" data-image-title=\"decomposition-book\" data-image-description=\"\" data-image-caption=\"\" data-large-file=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.cemeterydance.com\/extras\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/02\/decomposition-book.jpg?fit=675%2C1024&amp;ssl=1\" class=\"alignright size-medium wp-image-20508\" src=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.cemeterydance.com\/extras\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/02\/decomposition-book.jpg?resize=231%2C350&#038;ssl=1\" alt=\"cover of Decompostion Book\" width=\"231\" height=\"350\" srcset=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.cemeterydance.com\/extras\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/02\/decomposition-book.jpg?resize=231%2C350&amp;ssl=1 231w, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.cemeterydance.com\/extras\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/02\/decomposition-book.jpg?resize=675%2C1024&amp;ssl=1 675w, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.cemeterydance.com\/extras\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/02\/decomposition-book.jpg?resize=768%2C1165&amp;ssl=1 768w, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.cemeterydance.com\/extras\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/02\/decomposition-book.jpg?w=791&amp;ssl=1 791w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 231px) 85vw, 231px\" \/><a href=\"https:\/\/bookshop.org\/p\/books\/decomposition-book-sara-van-os\/cd0a6d8f80edd7a6?ean=9781335001894&amp;next=t\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\"><i>Decomposition Book\u00a0<\/i>by Sara Van Os<\/a><br \/>\nHarperCollins (May 19, 2026)<br \/>\nReviewed by\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.cemeterydance.com\/extras\/?s=elizabeth+broadbent\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Elizabeth Broadbent<\/a><br \/>\n<\/strong><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Loneliness and desperation ooze from Sara van Os\u2019s <\/span><i><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Decomposition Book: A Novel<\/span><\/i><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">. Os paints a compelling, bleak, and darkly humorous portrait of two women in crisis: Ava, hopelessly lost in the Adirondacks during a weekend hiking trip with two work friends, and Savannah, a Gen Z college student desperate to call herself \u201con a break\u201d from school. Holed up in a secluded lake house after the stunning betrayal of her best friend, Savannah finds Ava\u2019s corpse during a walk in the woods.\u00a0<\/span><!--more--><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">She examines the body. She finds a battered notebook, which contains the tale of Ava\u2019s final months in the wilderness. Os weaves the narratives together; the story of Ava\u2019s inevitable death parallels Savannah\u2019s descent into madness. She knows she ought to call the cops. But the corpse &#8212; Ava &#8212; seems so lonely. Doesn\u2019t she deserve to lay in peace for a little while? It couldn\u2019t hurt to wait a little bit. Could it? Os makes the reader almost-but-not-quite buy into her delusion. We understand Savannah\u2019s reasoning. We\u2019re with her. She\u2019s messy and confused, hurting and lonely, so her reasoning seems almost sane.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p><i><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Decomposition Book <\/span><\/i><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">is a tale of two lost women. Ava\u2019s scrabbling to survive in the woods and slowly starving; Savannah\u2019s doing her best to figure out her life &#8212; is she gay? Is she loveable? Should she take another ambien and drink? The real, wrenching sorrow of this novel comes from Ava\u2019s tale of love and loss; next to the disasters that befall her, Savannah\u2019s problems could seem overblown. But they\u2019re no less real for her. Os gives us a study in comparative misery, and it\u2019s clear that Savannah\u2019s problems are as urgent for her as Ava\u2019s desperation not to stave.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">As Savannah keeps reading, Ava\u2019s corpse, and the concept of Ava she\u2019s created, become a kind of free therapy. The strength in this novel: we buy it. As Ava\u2019s survival becomes more desperate, so does Savannah. Their stories make for an interesting juxtaposition, and they marry well, despite the dire circumstances of one and the easily dismissed nature of the other. How do you compare starving to death in the woods to a friend\u2019s betrayal? You don\u2019t, and that\u2019s the novel\u2019s point. You can\u2019t.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">A study in two women\u2019s efforts to save themselves, <\/span><i><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Decomposition Book <\/span><\/i><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">has a lot to say about suffering, what people do to survive, and how desperate people cling to whatever they can. Heartbreaking in the best possible way. <\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Decomposition Book\u00a0by Sara Van Os HarperCollins (May 19, 2026) Reviewed by\u00a0Elizabeth Broadbent Loneliness and desperation ooze from Sara van Os\u2019s Decomposition Book: A Novel. Os paints a compelling, bleak, and darkly humorous portrait of two women in crisis: Ava, hopelessly lost in the Adirondacks during a weekend hiking trip with two work friends, and Savannah, &hellip; <a href=\"https:\/\/www.cemeterydance.com\/extras\/review-decomposition-book\/\" class=\"more-link button bg-gold white\">Continue Reading!<span class=\"screen-reader-text\"> &#8220;Review: Decomposition Book by Sara Van Os&#8221;<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":5,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[80],"tags":[3615,3165,79,3616],"class_list":["post-20509","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-reviews","tag-decomposition-book","tag-elizabeth-broadbent","tag-reviews","tag-sara-van-os"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v27.6 - 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