Reading the synopsis of this book, I just knew it was going to be "my type of read". I absolutely love family sagas, and if the family is dysfunctional, so much the better. Maybe I put too much pressure on this one, because while there were many great features, I just didn't love it as much as I thought I would. The main reason was that it was just too long to hold my interest throughout. It's a fantastic character study (which I normally eat up) of parents and three children who all converge at their grandfather's funeral in Beirut. There is the current story, but then there is a lot of backstory into each character. While I understand why this was fundamental to the current state of the family dynamic, in my opinion it just took way too long to explore. Having said that, I'm not sure I can pinpoint where I would cut something out, except maybe the backstories could have been a bit more consolidated? Other than that, the writing was outstanding, the characters were really well drawn, and the overall plot was engaging. This was a hard review to write because I still can't put my finger on why I didn't love this, and that frustrates me since I want to be able to give a more specific reason.
If you love an interesting character driven book, and can be patient while the story slowly unfolds, this would be a good choice. I think I would have loved it if it had been less wordy. A solid good, but not great, read for me.
If you love an interesting character driven book, and can be patient while the story slowly unfolds, this would be a good choice. I think I would have loved it if it had been less wordy. A solid good, but not great, read for me.