Bests & Worsts Reviews from Amazon

Mrs. Everything (great title) is the story of two sisters, from their early childhood in 1951 through the present day -- and even beyond -- to the end of their lives. Bethie is the younger sister, preferred by her mother, expected to be pretty and traditional. Jo is the older sister, preferred by their father, awkward and smart and unwilling to wear dresses or conform. Their names are a pretty clear allusion to Little Women, and a lot of this book does straddle that line between archetype and cliche, as Jo and Bethie go through all the expected rites of passage of the timeframe: conformity of the 50s, SDS rebellion and drug experimentation in the 60s, retreat to conservative expectations in the Reagan 80s, and on. They also, between them, tackle all the tropes that one would put on a list: loss of parent, sexual experimentation, sex abuse, student rebellion, abuse by men in all kinds of different ways, etc. Does this sound like a criticism? I don't really mean for it to! I love this kind of book, the kind of book that Herman Wouk and Taylor Caldwell and Susan Isaacs used to write, the big old family saga. It's really out of character for Jennifer Weiner, a break from her more traditional women's literature, and it feels like she's actually found a sweet spot here. Relying on archetypes is not a bad thing to do in this kind of read; there's a reason they're archetypes. It's sort of deeply satisfying. And the writing is better than anything I've read from Ms. Weiner before. It's clear, detailed, and deeply invested. There's also a nice unexpected arc to the choices the sisters make, as their lives wind into adulthood and beyond. I loved every time I went to dive back into this book, it was like eating a big old fashioned box of chocolates. (Forrest Gump ruined that line, sorry.) Sure, it's kind of old fashioned. And you kind of know what is going to be in there, there's going to be some caramels and some nuts and some vanilla creams. But man, does it taste good, and man, are you happy every time you sit down. I will say that underneath the sort of predictable stuff, there are some undercurrents that are a bit new. For instance, there is some exploration of how the young men fighting for civil rights in the 1960s still expected the women to do women's work; about the retreat to conservatism in the 1980s, and how women seem to keep fighting the same battles again and again, to be heard, to be themselves. This feminist theme to the big soapy saga is different, and subtle, and nice. So...I have not historically been a huge fan of Ms. Weiner, finding some of her work predictable and safe. But this one bought me back around. This was just a huge amount of fun and a deeply satisfying book to read.