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lindsayw's review
3.0
I won this book as part of the Goodreads First Reads program. Full review to come when I receive it :)
Update: It worries me a little bit that I am the first one to review this book. It means I have to set the bar, and I definitely don't have the energy to set it really high by writing an awesome review. Instead, I'll just give you some of my thoughts on this book, which I guess is the point.
As mentioned above, this was a First Reads win for me, and it's not set to come out until August, so there could be some changes between now and then. In its current form, Once We Had a Country is a pretty good read. It's a quick book to get through, as I powered through it in just two days, and it wasn't really a challenge to do.
Until about halfway through the book I was worried that I wasn't going to be able to give it a very positive review, as I didn't really feel like I was connecting with any of the characters. However, at a certain point I realized that Maggie was really growing as a character and I had come to respect her more as a character and to sympathize with her more than I had originally. That was a pleasant surprise, because at the beginning I felt like she was really just beholden to Fletcher, and only did things to make him happy. But eventually she started to act for herself a bit more, and that was nice to see. Brid really improved for me too, undergoing a pretty extensive transformation over the course of the book. Fletcher really didn't do it for me; he was just too flaky (which was the idea, I think).
The plot wasn't quite what I was expecting based on the description of the giveaway. I thought it was going to be from the perspectives of multiple women whose partners left the States to avoid the draft. I don't know why I thought this, as looking back it doesn't appear to say any such thing, but there you go. As it was, this book is very focused on Maggie, and I think it actually could maybe have benefited from a closer look at some of the other women at the commune. I also would have liked to see more of Maggie's dad in Laos, but I guess I can understand why that was kept vague and only appeared occasionally in the story.
While I wish I could give voice to more extensive thoughts on the matter of this book, I'm worried that more details might ruin the story, and it is a good story. As I mentioned, there's a lot of pressure associated with being the first reviewer, so I don't want to spoil this for anybody. I'm glad I took a chance on this book, because I definitely don't regret it.
Update: It worries me a little bit that I am the first one to review this book. It means I have to set the bar, and I definitely don't have the energy to set it really high by writing an awesome review. Instead, I'll just give you some of my thoughts on this book, which I guess is the point.
As mentioned above, this was a First Reads win for me, and it's not set to come out until August, so there could be some changes between now and then. In its current form, Once We Had a Country is a pretty good read. It's a quick book to get through, as I powered through it in just two days, and it wasn't really a challenge to do.
Until about halfway through the book I was worried that I wasn't going to be able to give it a very positive review, as I didn't really feel like I was connecting with any of the characters. However, at a certain point I realized that Maggie was really growing as a character and I had come to respect her more as a character and to sympathize with her more than I had originally. That was a pleasant surprise, because at the beginning I felt like she was really just beholden to Fletcher, and only did things to make him happy. But eventually she started to act for herself a bit more, and that was nice to see. Brid really improved for me too, undergoing a pretty extensive transformation over the course of the book. Fletcher really didn't do it for me; he was just too flaky (which was the idea, I think).
The plot wasn't quite what I was expecting based on the description of the giveaway. I thought it was going to be from the perspectives of multiple women whose partners left the States to avoid the draft. I don't know why I thought this, as looking back it doesn't appear to say any such thing, but there you go. As it was, this book is very focused on Maggie, and I think it actually could maybe have benefited from a closer look at some of the other women at the commune. I also would have liked to see more of Maggie's dad in Laos, but I guess I can understand why that was kept vague and only appeared occasionally in the story.
While I wish I could give voice to more extensive thoughts on the matter of this book, I'm worried that more details might ruin the story, and it is a good story. As I mentioned, there's a lot of pressure associated with being the first reviewer, so I don't want to spoil this for anybody. I'm glad I took a chance on this book, because I definitely don't regret it.
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