Family Family

This book proves that Laurie Frankel's writing style works for me. This is my third time reading one of her books, and she has solidified herself as a favorite author. Her novels address serious, important topics with sincerity and sensitivity. The subject matter of her books is often personal to her, and that brings authenticity to her writing.

This is the story of television and movie actress India Allwood and the family she creates through adoption, both as a birth mother and adoptive mother. When the story begins, India and her adopted children, Fig and Jack, get caught up in a media storm due to India's comments about the movie in which she has recently starred, which focuses on a narrative about adoption that India feels is overdone and not representative of all adoption experiences. The fallout of her comments lead to the public learning about India's experience of placing a baby for adoption when she was young. The story then alternates between present day and flashbacks to India's youth, revealing the reasons, consequences, and benefits of her actions.

India is an interesting character who at times is frustrating and hard to understand, but she is never boring. Her love interests are developed enough to give them personality, but not enough to make them overshadow her. India's daughter Fig is a very likable, though naïve character who is constantly trying to fix things so that everyone can be happy, but her actions tend to escalate problems instead.

The dual timelines are executed well. The flashbacks occur at times in the plotline when explanation of past events is appropriate. The two timelines eventually converge in a satisfying way toward the end of the book.

The book explores a few serious topics including trauma, anxiety, feelings of abandonment, and adoption. Adoption is the main subject of the book, which presents the idea that there are many stories of adoption that should be told. I like that the book emphasizes that we should not presume to understand the feelings of those involved or make assumptions of how they should respond to their experiences. The book places a lot of emphasis on the fact that there are all kinds of families, including those with single mothers, gay parents, and adoptive parents.

Overall, I really like this book. I find Frankel's writing very readable with several insights on life and love. I underlined so many quotable lines that I want to go back to and think about. I highly recommend this book to readers who enjoy character-driven general fiction that explores important, timely topics.

4.5 Stars!