Reviewed by Sam@WLABB on
This is the Liane Moriarty I love. I adore the way Moriarty weaves the lives of her characters together, and how she slowly reveals that piece of the story that jars you. Until about page 425 (I think), I kept saying, "What happened at this barbecue?!" When the "what" was finally revealed, many of the behaviors began to make sense, and THEN! LM throws in another interesting tidbit, and adds another interesting layer to the story. But, wait, BOOM! She drops another bombshell. The last reveal was slightly shocking, but I suspected that was what had happened.
I found this book an interesting study of how a traumatic event can cause people to look at their lives, what they have or don't have, those they love or think they love. The event at the barbecue had our MCs reflecting on their romantic and "familial" relationships. One big relationship that was under the microscope for the entire book, was the friendship between Clementine and Erika. It was a tenuous relationship that began through Clementine's mother's urging and had endured many years. It was interesting to see the cracks that both women were aware of, but never faced head on, and how it took this "event" for each of them to reflect on what the other meant to them, and perhaps, discover the value of one another.
Moriarty did a wonderful job of slowly revealing the layers of her characters. Some, lost their shine during the course of the book, while others were quietly revealed to be quite beautiful souls. The only thing I didn't really understand, was the need for Vid and Tiffany AFTER the event. They seemed like superfluous characters, and their "secret" did not really seem important with respect to the story. Other than that, I loved this book, and the quiet beauty of the ending left me with a smile on my face and warm heart.
Reading updates
- Started reading
- 10 July, 2016: Finished reading
- 10 July, 2016: Reviewed