2025 Reading Challenge discussion

Tell us what you thought of the book! You can leave your review here. Even if you read the book outside of the group, please feel free to let us know what you thought of it.

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Just finished. I really like Patchett's writing. I just wish I liked her characters or plots better. I couldn't connect with any of the main characters. The chapters were not in sync chronologically, and it took me a few paragraphs to figure out where in the history of these families the chapter was placed. For me, this detracted from the actual story. 3.5 stars for the writing

It rarely happens that it takes me so little time to dislike a character, but Bert Cousins is a real piece of $%. He is disrespectful to his first wife, seriously neglects his children and leaves his second wife to deal with them. He is the main reason that his family is completely dysfunctional.
I loved reading this story from different perspectives and time points. It was surprisingly easy to keep the many characters (mostly the children) apart, yet with every new chapter I needed a bit of time to adjust to the the new point in life and perspective.

I liked the book. I can't say that I've found the contents exceptional, but it was sufficiently bittersweet, and combined with the writing itself, which was really a pleasure to read, it made a very enjoyable book.

The only nitpick for me is the character of Beverly, which I've found unbelievable and flat, more like a plot device than human character.

I didn't really enjoy the whole book. It seemed to just skip around too much for me. I started to learn about a character and the next chapter moved forward 20 years and was someone else. I didn't like Albert Cousins he couldn't be happy with what he had. He had a wife at home, goes after another man's wife and then cheats on her. He was a jerk.