Monday, April 2, 2012

CBR4 #14 - First You Try Everything by Jane McCafferty

An engrossing tale of a marriage that’s falling apart and a wife who will stop at nothing to keep it together.From their early days in college, Evvie and Ben were drawn to each other by feelings of isolation stemming from their wounded childhoods, passionate idealism, and zeal for music. Sheltered by their love, they weathered the challenges and trials of the imperfect world around them. But as the years passed, they grew apart. Now Ben has his sights set on a completely different kind of future—alone, or with someone else.Convinced that Ben cannot live without her, Evvie begins to unravel, as she obsessively devises ways to reclaim the love that she cannot let go of. She gambles on a spectacularly dangerous scheme, one that may ultimately have devastating consequences.Jane McCafferty has written a highly original, utterly beguiling, and emotionally satisfying novel about marriage. Told from alternating viewpoints, this gripping, psychologically astute, and madcap novel illuminates the power of love to define and transform our lives, for better or for worse.
Received an ARC of this book from Harper Collins

By accident - or on purpose - I've been drawn towards books focusing on marriage. The premise of this book sounded interesting, but I knew within 20-30 pages that this book was going in a different direction than I expected. The book moves back and forth between the wife and husband each being the narrator of the storySwitching between the two narrators wasn't hard to follow, but the style of them telling the story and then switching to some memory in the middle of the story was hard to follow.

Without giving away too much, Evvie's "solution" to get Ben back was very far fetched, but I could see as a mentally unstable person she would think that plan would work.  The ending of the book seemed very abrupt probably because the climax was so thrilling and exciting.  Overall, this book left a lot to be desired and just didn't resonate with me at all.  

1 comment:

  1. This is an excellent review. Even though the book wasn't something you liked, it was fair and succinctly written. Write on.

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