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A review by fulltimefiction
Home Front by Kristin Hannah
2.0
This book tells the story of a military family, Jolene is a pilot while her husband is a lawyer. He doesn’t exactly support her work. They have two children, Betsy (12 yo) and Lulu (4 yo). Jolene is always trying her best to be the perfect mother and wife. But Michael is tired of that. After his father’s death, their marriage starts falling apart. Michael is depressed and Jolene doesn't know how to help. Shortly after a bad conformation with her husband, Jolene is deployed to Iraq. What follows afterward is the story of this family and how they deal with their new realities.
While I was very invested in the book at first, the more I read, the less I was interested. I liked how the book started, I could’ve felt the cracks in the relationship, Jolene’s hurt, Michael’s loss.. but then I got bored. The story sadly did not keep engaged till the end especially when I reached a point where the plot took a very predictable turn.
The characters are what I usually love in Hannah’s books. Yet here while I liked Jolene and Michael at first, they annoyed me towards the end. Not irritation exactly as much as tiredness of listening to them.
She didn’t fail however at creating a strong female friendship -something she’s known for to me by now- between Jolene and Tammy. It was one of the things that helped me keep reading the book because Tammy was a well-written secondary character and a loyal friend.
See, all that is fine because the story so far would’ve still deserved 3 stars.
BUT. THE DAUGHTERS. God, they were awfully written.
I listened to the audiobook annnnnd I don’t recommend it.
While the narrator’s normal voice wasn’t annoying when she tried to imitate other voices, especially Betsy, I wanted to close my ears. Betsy is a spoiled, shallow, selfish, self-centered teen. She hates her mother for going to Iraq. She hates her for not being there when her period started. Uhm.. Hannah took a few flaws preteens are known for and magnified them. She’s 12 years old dammit. Well, there’s no age that justified such behavior so nevermind that last comment. She also made a scene because her father left her alone at the house and her mother always said Betsy should never come to an empty house. *eye roll*, well now I can say she’s 12 dammit. But that’s not the worst bit. The narrator imitating Betsy’s voice was. If I didn’t hate her while reading, I definitely would’ve (and did) because of the audio. It was terrible. So cringy.
On the other hand, Lulu didn’t act like 4 years old. I mean if she had a mental disability, that would be understandable for such behavior and talk. But this wasn’t hinted at in this book so I cannot assume that. 4 years old don’t act this way. I mostly come across too smart children but I don’t think I’ve come yet about a worse portray of a 4 yo. It made me cringe, again yes, and roll my eyes. Her comments were so stupid that Hannah made me feel like she’s never met a kid at that age before… I know kids that age, I had 2 cousins who are this age, and no, their mental capabilities go a lot beyond ice cream.
Another thing that annoyed me about the narrator was how she was trying to imitate the character's reactions by changing the tones of her voice and whilst it worked sometimes, other times it was just like a and acting and very fake.
This isn’t Hannah's best work but I’m still looking forward to reading the rest of her books. The next one should be Winter Garden, Firefly Lane, or the Four Winds… Depends on which audiobook I get my hands on first.
Briefly, this isn’t Hannah’s best work and if you’re not an established fan who has read a lot of her books, I wouldn’t recommend it. And definitely NOT the audiobook… I believe she has much better novels over there that are worthy of your time.