Fly Away Home by Jennifer Weiner

See what I mean?

I know, I know.  Never judge a book by it's cover.  But I couldn't help it.  It was so "Jodi Picoult-ish" that I couldn't help myself.  (Don't tell my fellow book club members, but I am a closet Picoult fan).  Plus, I was doing a double shift at the school book fair and had already read the first few chapters. I had to buy it.  (It's for the kids, ya know).

I had prepared myself for heart-wrenching drama, sadness and extreme emotion, but I really didn't need to.  In Fly Away Home, Sylvie Woodruff is a devoted senator's wife who has successfully raised two daughters.  She plays the part dutifully for over 20 years by helping with speeches, making social appearances and putting her own career on the back burner.  All of that falls apart when the media gets wind of her husband's affair with a 20-something staffer.  Couple that with her daughter Diana (a well-respected ER surgeon) admitting to cheating on HER husband and her other daughter Lizzie fresh out of yet another stint in rehab and the Woodruff women are a hot mess.  Eventually, they migrate to Connecticut and the summer home where they used to spend quality time together.  The three women spend several months reconnecting, reevaluating and reorganizing their lives.  They help each other forgive and set new priorities, some of which are different than ones they had in the past.

Meh.  It was sad.  I can do sad, but sad needs to have a purpose.  You know, like a terminal illness or a suicide.  This was just boring sad.  Sad because these three women made a series of bad decisions and neither one of them had the guts to tell the other one to "get out of your loveless marriage" or "put down that joint" or "quit hiding in your work and be engaged with your family."  There was no purpose to this sad other than to highlight some bad choices and three somewhat boring characters. 

Speaking of characters, I wish Weiner would have focused more on the grandmother and the rehab-rebound boyfriend.  The grandmother made me want to stand up and cheer especially when she gave her daughter regular bouts of unsolicited advice.  Go grandma!  As for the boyfriend, he was sweet.  He accepted Lizzie for who she was and didn't run when she ended up getting pregnant by him and then trying to push him away.  He was the only stand-up guy in the novel and it was a shame he was only written in at the halfway-ish point.

Since book covers seem to be so misleading (at least to me) I think I will stick to downloading ebooks.  They don't really qualify as having covers, do they?  Either that or I let Sarah and Carrie (my fellow TFA bloggers) pick out books for me to read.  On second thought,  I'll stick to ebooks.   It will be safer for everyone that way.