When We Lost Our Heads

A Novel

By: Heather O'Neill

Narrated by: Jeanna Phillips

“Every decent friendship comes with a drop of hatred. But that hatred is like honey in the tea. It makes it addictive.”

Charismatic Marie Antoine is the daughter of the richest man in 19th century Montreal. She has everything she wants, except for a best friend—until clever, scheming Sadie Arnett moves to the neighborhood. Immediately united by their passion and intensity, Marie and Sadie attract and repel each other in ways that thrill them both. Their games soon become tinged with risk, even violence. Forced to separate by the adults around them, they spend years engaged in acts of alternating innocence and depravity. And when a singular event brings them back together, the dizzying effects will upend the city.

Traveling from a repressive finishing school to a vibrant brothel, taking readers firsthand into the brutality of factory life and the opulent lives of Montreal’s wealthy, When We Lost Our Heads dazzlingly explores gender, sex, desire, class, and the terrifying power of the human heart when it can’t let someone go.

Critic reviews

"This novel has everything...opulence, whimsy, sugar barons, brothels, factories, revolution, and an intense friendship that forces both participants to straddle darkness and light while clinging to one another for dear life." —Literary Hub

"A twisted, perverse story that's difficult to put down...you'll be desperate to know what [the characters] do next." —Buzzfeed

"Delightful...The plot satisfies with twists and turns to the end, but it’s the audaciousness of spirit emboldening most of [O'Neill's] female characters that makes this novel shine." —New York Journal of Books

“These perversely fascinating characters are filled with guile and bile and many things vile, and even though it’s virtually a certainty that they are star-crossed, it’s impossible to tear one’s gaze away.” —BookPage

“O’Neill’s sharp descriptions and her prose’s archaic slant successfully immerse readers in the period...this distinctive, character-driven story is delightfully perverse.” —Publishers Weekly

"O’Neill uses evocative descriptions and near-constant tension to carry this dark almost-fairy-tale to anunexpected conclusion." —Booklist

“With irreverence and charm, O’Neill takes us into the vivid worlds of Sadie and Marie, unlikely friends who find themselves in the thrall of shared dark passions, threatening to destroy all they have come to know. When We Lost Our Heads is a lovely, uncanny take on the historical novel, told with O’Neill’s trademark wit and empathy for human foibles.” —Esi Edugyan, author of Washington Black

“A dazzling, delicious dream…penned with equal parts arsenic-laced icing and blood. There are marvels and dark delights on every page as O’Neill masterfully unfurls the lifelong love affair of Sadie and Marie, whose tale is illuminated by the triumphs of female desire over the crushing designs of men. The spell this novel casts is irresistible.” —Mona Awad, author of All’s Well

“I am struggling to say how much I loved this book…It is a beautiful, alarming, outraged, outrageous, dancing, laughing, shrieking, bellowing, howling, gobbling piece of wonder. What a joy!” —Edward Carey, author of The Swallowed Man

Wow

What a wild ride this book was. At times I felt the violence / explicit content was a bit gratuitous, but in the end I understood and appreciated the choice. Great narration. I like to read along with the physical book and I felt I appreciated the writing more when I had the book open too, but the narration was really well done and easy to follow.

Chas Dickens x Edith Wharton, with Lesbians

Dickens morality and two dimensionality, featuring a rich girl who blames a joint murder on social-climbing family’s “smarter than everyone else” friend. Later, the social climber writes what becomes a famous titillating book with the help of a cross-dressing lesbian, but the social climber takes all the credit, then re-joins society with the spoiled rich girl, leaving the masc lesbian behind. That’s okay, though; she starts a feminist movement.

The bad gals get their comeuppances, the nice butch makes some positive changes to the world, and you finish the book having seen all polish and no wood (pun intended for those of the strap-on persuasion).

I could not put this book down

I am blown away. I love this storyline. The complex ideas, all laid out so well. The character development, how the plot built overtime and when it jumped back in time it was clear where you were and what was going on.
I had 17 minutes left. And I did not want to finish this book, because I did not want this story to be over. Yet, I couldn't help myself more than one day to sit and listen to how this was tied together.
20/10 would recommend
Thank you for sharing these, words, ideas, and these people into my life. I am forever grateful for storytellers.

Fizzled out

This book was completely directionless at the court. It’s a story about a two girls and their friendship, but the overall theme was lost with everything else going on. I feel like the author tried to fit in too many messages in the story.

The narrator was problematic for me.

The story was good but many short sentences made it feel choppy in its cadence, and the lilting voice was a lot. Kept wanting the young girl voice to mature or something. The story was interesting and the characters well formed, don’t regret reading it, liked the femininity of it all most