The Nest
Ratings45
Average rating3.5
15
Ratings45
Average rating3.5
An instant Globe and Mail bestseller “Hilarious and big-hearted, The Nest is a stellar debut.” —People (A Best Book of 2016) “Her writing is like really good dark chocolate: sharper and more bittersweet than the cheap stuff, but also too delicious not to finish in one sitting.” —Entertainment Weekly “Humor and delightful irony abound in this lively first novel.” —The New York Times Book Review A wickedly smart, funny and deeply felt debut novel about four adult siblings and the fate of their long-depended-upon family inheritance. An instant Globe and Mail bestseller On a wintry afternoon in New York City, Melody, Beatrice and Jack Plumb gather to confront their charismatic and reckless older brother, Leo, who has just been released from rehab. Leo’s bad behaviour, culminating in a car crash while under the influence—a nineteen-year-old waitress beside him—has endangered the Plumbs’ joint trust fund, or “the Nest,” as they’ve taken to calling it. The four siblings are at very different places in their lives, but all believe that this money will solve a host of self-inflicted problems and their consequences. And until Leo’s accident, they’d been mere months away from receiving it. Can Leo get the Plumbs out of this mess, as he’s always been able to do for himself before? Or will the Plumb siblings have to do without the money and the future lives they’ve envisioned? As the siblings grapple with family tensions, old histories and the significant emotional and financial cost of the accident, Sweeney introduces an unforgettable cast of supporting characters: Leo’s stalwart ex-girlfriend who now thinks that maybe, just maybe, he is capable of change; the waitress whose life was shattered in the accident and the Iraqi war veteran who falls in love with her; and a retired, grieving firefighter with a very big secret. Tender, funny and deftly written, The Nest explores what money does to relationships, what happens to our ambitions over the course of our lives, and the fraught but unbreakable ties we have with our families.
Reviews with the most likes.
That was one heck of a dysfunctional family. This book reads like a soap opera that you get caught into and want to know more!
the only good or valid characters in this book are Louisa and Nora
Meh. It was a fun, easy read, but ask me what it was about in a few years and I will have most likely forgotten.
This was an enjoyable, quick and easy read; I didn't particularly love it, but the writing is delicate and deliberate and I found myself swept up in the family drama. However, it felt suuuppeer bougie, ensconced in a perspective of white privilege (and considering that is my own perspective, I did not enjoy it as I seek books as a means to widen my own perspective). And I bought the internal lives of the characters fell a bit flat/all ran into each other. Some characters were barely fleshed out at all, so it felt strange to have even brief access to their psyche. And the ending felt a little too happily-ever-after for me.
