After reading the summary, I chose this book as one of my summer beach reads because it sounded like it would be a perfect fit. I’ve never read anything by Jane Green before, though I had heard of her other works and know that most of them fall into the “chick lit” category, so with this book, I was expecting a light, easy-to-read story focused around women. That’s pretty much what I got except the part about the matriarch of the family, Ronni Sunshine, having a terminal illness and therefore wanting her daughters to help her end her life (not spoiler, since both these plot points are in the cover summary). While that part of the book lent an element of “seriousness” to the story, everything else was light-hearted enough so that things balanced out in the end.
Overall, I would say that this was a good book and the story itself was enjoyable, however what fell short for me were the characters, none of whom were likable. While I’m perfectly fine with (and actually prefer) flawed characters in stories, the caveat is that the characters need to be realistically written, which I felt was a bit lacking with this story. All the characters felt too contrived and some of the situations they went through felt too convenient, almost as though specifically written so that the characters would go down certain already pre-determined paths. I think what bothered me the most was how cliched and stereotypical the characters seemed to be – for example: the self-absorbed successful actress but horrible mother Ronni, the serious and responsible but emotionally detached oldest sister Nell, the insecure due to being largely ignored “people pleaser” middle sister Meredith, the spoiled and bratty youngest sister Lizzy who always gets her way because she thinks the world revolves around only her. And that’s just the main female characters! The men in the story seemed to have it worse, as almost all of them (except for the 2 sons of the sisters, who were mostly kids throughout the story) were portrayed as “losers” of some sort – i.e.: deadbeats who abandon their first families after they remarry, womanizers who have one affair after another with a variety of women, weak husbands/boyfriends who are consistently emotionally detached from their significant others, arrogant jerks who emotionally abuse their wives/girlfriends in efforts to exert complete control over them, etc. I could go on, but I’m sure you get the picture. It also didn’t help that everything worked out perfectly in the end for all the characters, almost exactly as we (the readers) expected them to. The way everything ended up being neatly packaged and wrapped in a bow for the readers kind of reminded me of those Hallmark (or was it Lifetime?) movies that were quite the craze many years ago.
I usually judge how good a book is by whether it is able to elicit an emotional response from me (i.e. move me to tears) and/or whether it is thought-provoking enough that I continue thinking about the story/characters long after I finish reading. Neither of these elements was present in this case. My frustration with all the unlikable characters made it difficult for me to feel any type of emotional connection with anyone in the story – even when “sad” things happened, I unfortunately could not bring myself to empathize or feel anything emotionally, despite the intent of the author (I’m assuming) to elicit some type of response from most readers (though not really the author’s fault I guess, since I don’t consider myself a “typical” reader).
I ended up giving this book 3.5 stars, mostly because of the writing and the fact that I did like the story, even though I was annoyed with the characters -- no doubt that Jane Green is a good writer and knows how to tell an enjoyable story. I would consider this book on the higher end of the “chick lit” spectrum and even though it didn’t quite work out for me, I would still recommend it for those who enjoy this genre and are looking for a nice, quick summer read. It also might be a good idea to perhaps read the other reviews for a different opinion before deciding.
Received
advance reader’s copy from Berkley Books via NetGalley
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