Grade: 3.5 out 5
Forty-two and divorced, Holli Templeton has just begun to realize the pleasures of owning her life for the first time. But the experience is short-lived. Her son Conner has unexpectedly fled college in Rhode Island and moved to Texas with his troubled girlfriend, Kilian. This alone is difficult to handle, but as Holli begins to understand the depth of the girl’s problems, concern turns to crisis.
Conner’s situation is worsening, and as if that’s not enough, Holli notices signs of serious decline in the beloved Texas grandmother who raised her. She has no choice but to leave the comfort zone of life in New York and return to her hometown in Texas to care for the people she loves.
In the tight space between these two generations, Holli initially feels lost. The journey back stirs so many unresolved hurts from her childhood. But something else happens in this uneasy homecoming. Comfort arrives in the ethereal presence of the mother long lost to her, and Holli is surprised to find that as she struggles to help her son and grandmother, the wounds of her own past begin to heal.
The space between before and after easily the most challenging place she has ever known begins to reveal an unanticipated hope for what the future might hold.
This book centers around a three day trip out to Thaxton, Texas that changes things forever. It’s about a family who struggles through some pretty crazy things that change the whole lot of them. We’ve got Holli, who is 42 and divorced with a son named Connor who dropped out of school at Brown to move across the country to live in Texas with his girlfriend, Killian. They live in a trailer outside Connor’s great grandmother Raine’s house and Killian is in the hospital so Connor’s suffering through his own stuff when his mother, Holli comes out to Texas to check on her grandmother, Raine…the woman she thinks is going crazy because she’s seeing Holli’s dead mother after many years of being dead.
The family comes together in Thaxton in hopes of fixing things but drama unfolds everywhere.
The book overall isn’t too bad but there were times while I was reading this book where I really had to focus on what was going on, who was mad at who and it was all a bit much for me right now. There were problems that needed to be dealt with from childhoods and I couldn’t drum up enough energy to sympathize with anyone.
The middle of this book was a real trial to get through and it lagged a bit but if you stick through with this book it ends up being an enjoyable read. I’m glad I finished the book but I don’t think that it’s a book that I will be rereading any time soon.
Should you read this book? If you’re in the mood for some family drama and journeys of self discovery then yeah, try it out but if you want some happy happy go lucky books then this isn’t the book for you.
This book is available from Harper Collins. You can buy it here or here in e-format.