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A review by byashleylamar
A Simple Thing by Kathleen McCleary
2.0
When her sensitive son, Quinn, is being bullied at school and her teenage daughter Katie is being, well, a teenager Susannah does what she has always done - she runs away. She takes her two children and she flees to the remote island of Sounder, just off the coast of Washington, so that she can protect them even if it means leaving her husband, their school, their friends, and their routine life behind. On Sounder the children must share a room (although Quinn ultimately sleeps in the utility room instead), there is no hospital, no refrigerator, no grocery store, limited cell phone access, limited internet access and a ton of unsupervised free time. This is the perfect situation to keep an eye on, and protect, two children, right? Let's also keep in mind that Susannah is terrified of boats, of the water and of having her children anywhere near the water. That alone makes her decision to move to an island stupid but it's ridiculous once you factor in all of the other things. If it hadn't been for Betty's story I would have given up on this book in the early chapters.
The characters, aside from Betty, were so one-dimensional and so cliche! There was the:
Damaged, whiny and self-loathing adult woman - Susannah
Doormat of a husband - Matt
Sensitive and misunderstood son - Quinn
Rebellious and defiant teenage daughter - Katie
Wise and free-spirited older man - Barefoot
Wise and loving older woman - Betty
Then factor in Jim and his sons (the "perfect" man and his two too-good-to-be-true boys) and the book was painstakingly full of your standard sappy women's fiction people. None of them showed any depth or growth until the final two chapters of the book when Susannah finally (and barely) overcomes her fears and only then because her teenage daughter was talking her through it. The change in Katie seemed to happen with the flip of a switch and all of her problems wrapped up so neatly in the end.
The saving grace of this novel was Betty. The book is told in an alternating POV between Susannah and Betty which is the only reason I was able to read this through to the end. When Susannah's chapters came up I groaned knowing it was going to be more of the same whining and being overcome with this gripping fear of the water and a childhood incident that still haunts her but when Betty's chapters began I would excitedly read. She was a great character! She evolved as the story progressed and she had a story to tell. Her marriage to an untrustable dog, her fertility struggles, her son, her relationships, her life on Sounder, all of it was worth reading. If this book had been all about Betty it would be, undeniably, a better book. Even though Susannah's story was the one driving the novel it was Betty's story that stole the show. The author picked the wrong story, and the wrong character, to write about.
It's tolerable but nothing special.
Closed the Cover
The characters, aside from Betty, were so one-dimensional and so cliche! There was the:
Damaged, whiny and self-loathing adult woman - Susannah
Doormat of a husband - Matt
Sensitive and misunderstood son - Quinn
Rebellious and defiant teenage daughter - Katie
Wise and free-spirited older man - Barefoot
Wise and loving older woman - Betty
Then factor in Jim and his sons (the "perfect" man and his two too-good-to-be-true boys) and the book was painstakingly full of your standard sappy women's fiction people. None of them showed any depth or growth until the final two chapters of the book when Susannah finally (and barely) overcomes her fears and only then because her teenage daughter was talking her through it. The change in Katie seemed to happen with the flip of a switch and all of her problems wrapped up so neatly in the end.
The saving grace of this novel was Betty. The book is told in an alternating POV between Susannah and Betty which is the only reason I was able to read this through to the end. When Susannah's chapters came up I groaned knowing it was going to be more of the same whining and being overcome with this gripping fear of the water and a childhood incident that still haunts her but when Betty's chapters began I would excitedly read. She was a great character! She evolved as the story progressed and she had a story to tell. Her marriage to an untrustable dog, her fertility struggles, her son, her relationships, her life on Sounder, all of it was worth reading. If this book had been all about Betty it would be, undeniably, a better book. Even though Susannah's story was the one driving the novel it was Betty's story that stole the show. The author picked the wrong story, and the wrong character, to write about.
It's tolerable but nothing special.
Closed the Cover