Ratings20
Average rating4.2
NEW YORK TIMES BEST SELLER • “A gripping and poignant ode to a messy, loving family in all its glory.” —Madeline Miller, bestselling author of Circe In this “rich, complex family saga” (USA Today) full of long-buried family secrets, Marilyn Connolly and David Sorenson fall in love in the 1970s, blithely ignorant of all that awaits them. By 2016, they have four radically different daughters, each in a state of unrest. Wendy, widowed young, soothes herself with booze and younger men; Violet, a litigator turned stay-at-home-mom, battles anxiety and self-doubt; Liza, a neurotic and newly tenured professor, finds herself pregnant with a baby she's not sure she wants by a man she's not sure she loves; and Grace, the dawdling youngest daughter, begins living a lie that no one in her family even suspects. With the unexpected arrival of young Jonah Bendt—a child placed for adoption by one of the daughters fifteen years before—the Sorensons will be forced to reckon with the rich and varied tapestry of their past. As they grapple with years marred by adolescent angst, infidelity, and resentment, they also find the transcendent moments of joy that make everything else worthwhile.
Reviews with the most likes.
Listened to the audiobook while doing other tasks, and it felt like listening to the novel version of a TV show. Enjoyable, but probably wouldn’t have stuck it out if I was reading the physical book.
Families are hard work but they're also the best thing that's ever happened to us. No matter what kind of family you come from, traditional or not, this is a book that will make you laugh and will make think.
It's very long, with so many POV switches (often in the same scene) you can't be blamed for getting confused. And the interruptions, pauses, hems and haws that all the characters do in conversation can get a bit maddening, and yet – and yet, I loved this intergenerational saga of four daughters and their still-crazy-about-each other-after-all-these-years parents. Ideal for fans who plowed through Little Fires Everywhere and need another fix of a story with honest, flawed, loving humans interacting with each other. Not a stereotype in the bunch.