EVERYONE IN THIS ROOM WILL SOMEDAY BE DEAD follows chronically anxious Gilda as she navigates her way through a world where death lurks around every corner. Or does it? Her crippling health-anxiety, along with her deep-seated need to please everyone but herself, runs nearly every aspect of her life. Accepting a job as a receptionist for a church when all she was really looking for was therapy, Gilda’s life begins to spiral as her new position threatens to upend her entire life.

As a person with an anxiety disorder myself, Emily Austin’s EVERYONE IN THIS ROOM WILL SOMEDAY BE DEAD is the most accurate representation of an anxious mind I’ve ever read and it’s relatable on a level that I can’t quite say I’ve ever experienced. The scatterbrained storytelling on the part of Austin had me racing through the book with little regard for what was happening around me; I simply devoured this in a few sittings. Although there were points where I was nearly screaming at Gilda for her extremely poor choices, I had to remind myself that I’ve been in somewhat similar situations where I would just go along with whatever people wanted so as to not risk disappointing them. There were so many laugh-out-loud moments in this book (“I am the final baby”) that I think I may have broken a personal record for highlighted passages on my Kindle. As insufferable as Gilda may seem to other readers, I would be the first to fight for her; even if she would absolutely hate it.

Emily Austin is an exceptional author who has rocketed to the top of my “must-read” writers. You would be doing yourself a disservice by skipping this one.