Saturday, November 14, 2015

Did You Ever Have A Family by Bill Clegg

My rating: 4.3

On the eve of her daughter’s wedding, June Reid’s life is completely devastated when a shocking disaster takes the lives of her daughter, her daughter’s fiancé, her ex-husband, and her boyfriend, Luke—her entire family, all gone in a moment. And June is the only survivor. June flees on a road trip.

This is well written, and is told in a very compelling way in flashing back and forth in time and from different narrators perspectives. It has many moments where I gasped as things unfolded. All of these things I loved.  What I didn't care for was the myriad of characters and storylines. There were so many that I started to detach from the story which is sad as it was very worthwhile and I do understand why many have rated this book higher.

 This is dark and deep but it isn't maudlin or wallowing.  It is almost matter of fact in the unfolding. This was both good and bad - good in that it didn't get too dark in the face of such tragic events but bad in that I didn't feel much for the characters.

 Clegg is a fabulous story teller and I would read more by him.

4 comments:

  1. jeanaNovember 14, 2015 at 4:29 PM

    This looks very good. Adding to my TBR

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    1. Elle Is For LivingNovember 14, 2015 at 4:31 PM

      It is good if you don't lose sleep on all of the non-relevant characters. It is written in a very cool way. BTW, love that you and your hubby are in the same book club! :-)

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  2. jeanaNovember 15, 2015 at 6:23 AM

    Thanks for the tip about non-relevant characters...

    I started a Book Club last year when we moved to a new neighborhood. I got responses from a couple of guys that were "sort of" interested so I bribed my husband to join so that the other two would join. It makes discussions really fun, very interesting to hear differing perspectives from men and women's POV. It also pushes everyone to read outside of their comfort zones.

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    1. Elle Is For LivingNovember 15, 2015 at 8:52 AM

      Love that. My gf is a waitress and in a bookclub at her work and she says the guys add a lot and get her to read different books too. I think that is very cool. Maybe one day I will see about getting Mark into a bookclub :-)

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