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3.64 AVERAGE
3.64 AVERAGE
Surprising, smart, uplifting, and fucking hilarious.
Seemed to oscillate back and forth between grasping for depth and trying to be funny. Worthwhile and quick but not a favourite.
Harry and his brother George have not really got along for most of their lives. Harry is a mild-mannered historian who teaches at a college, George is high-flying tv executive. One Thanksgiving after dinner George's wife kisses Harry and their affair ends up with George charged with the murder of his wife and Harry losing his wife and his job. Facing life as a single man and charged with looking after George's children, Harry has to find a new path in life.
In this book A M Homes has taken a simple story of rivalry and infidelity and created a funny and clever novel. Neither Harry nor George is particularly likeable at the start but in exploring his new life Harry has a series of professional and sexual encounters that have huge influence on his future. The sub-plots about love among the retirees and the nature of Jewish families are wonderfully entertaining. Whilst this is a long book, it never seems overly extended and delights regularly.
In this book A M Homes has taken a simple story of rivalry and infidelity and created a funny and clever novel. Neither Harry nor George is particularly likeable at the start but in exploring his new life Harry has a series of professional and sexual encounters that have huge influence on his future. The sub-plots about love among the retirees and the nature of Jewish families are wonderfully entertaining. Whilst this is a long book, it never seems overly extended and delights regularly.
favorite passages:
"Pondering the high hopes, the promise, the great aspiration of RMN, I start thinking of myself. I trip over a psychic speed bump, tumble down, and am deep into my own family history. The irony is that, though my parents expected George and me to grow up and be president, they didn't believe we were actually even capable of crossing the street on our own. It was the mixed message, simultaneous extremes of expectation and reminders that we weren't worth crap, that in retrospect seems abusive. I am sure it was 'unintentional' and was born from their own deprivation and the sense that we should be lucky for anything we got. I always had the feeling that my family was somehow 'defective' and that it was those well-matched flaws -- the ability to love and loathe all at once -- that kept my parents together. Basically, they were lousy with bitterness. We were supposed to become president ruling from the children's table while never daring to dream of going beyond where our parents had been; never transcending." [pages 201-202]
"I find myself craving the normal, the repetitious, the everyday, the banal. I crave the comfort of what might seem to others to be exceedingly boring." [page 260]
"There is a world out there, so new, so random and disassociated that it puts us all in danger. We talk online, we 'friend' each other when we don't know who we are really talking to -- we fuck strangers. We mistake almost anything for a relationship, a community of sorts, and yet, when we are with our families, in our communities, we are clueless, we short-circuit and immediately dive back into the digitized version -- it is easier, because we can be both our truer selves and our fantasy selves all at once, with each carrying equal weight." [page 294]
"Pondering the high hopes, the promise, the great aspiration of RMN, I start thinking of myself. I trip over a psychic speed bump, tumble down, and am deep into my own family history. The irony is that, though my parents expected George and me to grow up and be president, they didn't believe we were actually even capable of crossing the street on our own. It was the mixed message, simultaneous extremes of expectation and reminders that we weren't worth crap, that in retrospect seems abusive. I am sure it was 'unintentional' and was born from their own deprivation and the sense that we should be lucky for anything we got. I always had the feeling that my family was somehow 'defective' and that it was those well-matched flaws -- the ability to love and loathe all at once -- that kept my parents together. Basically, they were lousy with bitterness. We were supposed to become president ruling from the children's table while never daring to dream of going beyond where our parents had been; never transcending." [pages 201-202]
"I find myself craving the normal, the repetitious, the everyday, the banal. I crave the comfort of what might seem to others to be exceedingly boring." [page 260]
"There is a world out there, so new, so random and disassociated that it puts us all in danger. We talk online, we 'friend' each other when we don't know who we are really talking to -- we fuck strangers. We mistake almost anything for a relationship, a community of sorts, and yet, when we are with our families, in our communities, we are clueless, we short-circuit and immediately dive back into the digitized version -- it is easier, because we can be both our truer selves and our fantasy selves all at once, with each carrying equal weight." [page 294]
adventurous
dark
emotional
funny
hopeful
inspiring
reflective
sad
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Complicated
Diverse cast of characters:
Complicated
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Complicated
This book pulled me in with a salacious and then tragic beginning and it just developed and evolved into something else entirely that “cu-thunked” me on the head and gave me a cautionary hope and better understanding of the complexity and surprises of human nature and relationships.
I had seen books by a.m.homes with there distinctive spines in my local library but never bothered with them until I heard Richard osman recommending one on between the covers and I am so glad he did as this is one of the best books I have read in a long while. Read it and enjoy.
A 2013 staff fiction favorite recommended by Haley and Connie.
Check our catalog: http://encore.cooklib.org/iii/encore/search/C__Smay%20we%20be%20forgiven%20homes__Orightresult__U1?lang=eng&suite=pearl
Check our catalog: http://encore.cooklib.org/iii/encore/search/C__Smay%20we%20be%20forgiven%20homes__Orightresult__U1?lang=eng&suite=pearl
dark
funny
lighthearted
reflective
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Complicated
This was weird and somewhat dark but oddly funny and the ending was kind of wholesome