Welcome to Litsy!

Set in Brooklyn, NYC, I‘m making this my pick for this month for #fictionaltraveler.

I do like a small town novel and this was no exception. I liked hearing the perspectives of each other and of events through both Amy & Isabelle. It was a very slow start (almost bailed) and it wasn‘t until the halfway point that I really got invested but the second half unfolded perfectly. Loved the backdrop of characters, how we get to hear Isabelle‘s story and see her opening up and the mother/daughter relationship. #readyourkindle

Such a lovely tribute to a mother and grandmother. Strength and perseverance at its best.

I'm often disappointed by psychological suspense even though I love the idea of it so much, and I thought this one mostly held up! The characters were well thought-out and I questioned everything and everyone.

#bookspin @TheAromaofBooks

I didn‘t feel this book was as cohesive as it could be. I felt there was a lot going on between issues in the mothers life and issues in the daughters life. Everything connects in the end but I kinda just felt pulled all over the place. It was still an entertaining and easy read though.

Read in 2024. There‘s a lot going on in this story: parent abandonment, drug abuse/DV/emotional abuse, jealousy. The story spans over many years. It was a decent story. I really liked Benjamin‘s research that she did about the history of surfing (which I found more interesting & found more books to read).

A great example of duality perspectives puzzle piecing the story together. It was interesting until the end!

I liked it, especially when things finally started coming together toward the end. Multiple POV‘s, multiple timelines, and a lot of redirecting meant it took me a while to get my bearings. I had a suspicion about halfway thru that ended up being correct! The characters were not easy to like, they were all fairly unbearable actually. But I was kept entertained thru a particularly busy workweek, which worked well for me.

So imagine if two people brought the same puzzles together and l decided to combine the pieces before putting together two of the same puzzle. then they discover that each box also contained pieces of other puzzles. Yeah, like that.

Strout‘s debut novel about a mother and a daughter, and their relationship. Amy is 16 and just starting life. Isabelle is a single parent, working as a secretary at the factory, trying to get by. It‘s the warmest summer in memory and things are about to change.