Big Library Read - A Very Typical Family

 

Before I tell you anything about the book, let me just say that I love the idea of the Big Library Read. Libraries all over the country, all over the world, make the same book available to any library card holders (although from the website, it looks like you might not even need a library card to borrow). There are no waitlists. There are all sorts of discussions online. There are resources for in-person book club discussions. I love anything that makes books accessible to more people. This summer's Big Library Read was A Very Typical Family by Sierra Godfrey.

This is a story about second chances within your family. Fifteen years earlier, Natalie called the police after her sister knocked her head while falling down the stairs. Natalie had arrived home to her sister, brother, and their friend stoned out of their minds. Natalie got into an argument with her sister that lead to the fall. (The comment I'd like to insert here would be a spoiler so I'll keep it to myself.) The brother and sister end up in prison and Natalie leaves home and never looks back. She has no contact with her sister or brother and minimal contact with her mother. Even that contact dries up after awhile. 

Natalie, in a job she doesn't really like, with a boyfriend she doesn't really love, gets a letter from a lawyer in California that her mother has died. Her mother owned a large Victorian house that she's leaving to her three kids but the only way they can inherit the house is if they are all at the house together. Considering the fact that they don't speak, at all, that might be difficult.

Natalie drives across the country from Boston to Santa Cruz, California with her cat and some insect or other creature that she keeps in a jar and feeds crickets. Shortly after she arrives, her sister, Lynn, and Lynn's son, Kit, arrive at the house. Somehow they manage to stay there together. Natalie then starts the search for their brother, Jake. He's some respected orthinotologist at some big institute in Santa Cruz. Only he's been missing for weeks and no one knows where he is. Will they be able to find Jake so they can inherit the house?

The book was pleasant enough to read. Something nagged at me the entire time (same spoiler I referred to earlier) but otherwise, I looked forward to seeing how the author would resolve things.

I loved the relationship that Natalie develops with her newly discovered nephew, Kit. I loved how Natalie realized the importance of her female friendships. And I loved the sense of place that Sierra Godfrey creates. (Santa Cruz is her hometown and you can tell.) Now I'd love to visit Santa Cruz! But yes, there was that one little issue that bugged me. And from some of the online discussions that I read, it bothered other readers as well.