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A review by kaelaceleste
Great Big Beautiful Life by Emily Henry
emotional
lighthearted
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
3.75
What to say about this! I went into this book with low expectations despite loving Emily Henry as an author, because I'd heard some mixed reviews from other folks. I did like it, but I definitley liked it less than her others. It feels unfair to compare newer books to her holy trinity (Beach Read, People We Meet on Vacation and Book Lovers) but this felt like there were too many different pieces going on at once, which made all of it feel pretty rushed.
This felt like it was trying to be three stories in one... a drama about traumatic family relationships, a mystery about the life of an older celebrity woman who is surrounded by secrets, and an Emily Henry romance with cute banter and fun characters. And it had pieces of all of those, but I wish we had committed to one or even two of those plotlines. Alice's mom sucked and maybe it's because of my own mommy issues but I just have trouble believing that every problem she had with her mom was solved after one emotional confession. I did like the two main characters, but I felt like they were underdeveloped. It was pretty instalovey and overall just felt very rushed. I wish we had spent more time getting to know them. Again it feels unfair to compare it to Emily Henry's past books but sue me, I'm doing that. And the whole Margaret story just felt so much like Evelyn Hugo, PLUS with Julia Whelan narrating? Girl I was waiting for Mick Riva to show up.
It's still a 3.5ish. And I'll continue to read every book she writes so really no harm done 🙂↕️
This felt like it was trying to be three stories in one... a drama about traumatic family relationships, a mystery about the life of an older celebrity woman who is surrounded by secrets, and an Emily Henry romance with cute banter and fun characters. And it had pieces of all of those, but I wish we had committed to one or even two of those plotlines. Alice's mom sucked and maybe it's because of my own mommy issues but I just have trouble believing that every problem she had with her mom was solved after one emotional confession. I did like the two main characters, but I felt like they were underdeveloped. It was pretty instalovey and overall just felt very rushed. I wish we had spent more time getting to know them. Again it feels unfair to compare it to Emily Henry's past books but sue me, I'm doing that. And the whole Margaret story just felt so much like Evelyn Hugo, PLUS with Julia Whelan narrating? Girl I was waiting for Mick Riva to show up.
It's still a 3.5ish. And I'll continue to read every book she writes so really no harm done 🙂↕️
Content Warnings
Graphic: Grief, Death of parent
Moderate: Death, Sexual content, Car accident
Minor: Mental illness, Dementia, Pregnancy