One of Real Simple’s Best Books of 2019“I loved this book. . . .Funny, heartbreaking and clever with a mystery at its heart.” -Jojo Moyes“With an eye as keen for human idiosyncrasies as Miranda July’s, and a sense of humor as bright and surprising as Maria Semple’s, this is a novel of pure velocity.” -Publishers Weekly (starred review)Twenty years ago, Abigail Sorenson’s brother Robert went … –Publishers Weekly (starred review)
Twenty years ago, Abigail Sorenson’s brother Robert went missing one day before her sixteenth birthday, never to be seen again. That same year, she began receiving scattered chapters in the mail of a self-help manual, the Guidebook, whose anonymous author promised to make her life soar to heights beyond her wildest dreams.
The Guidebook’s missives have remained a constant in Abi’s life—a befuddling yet oddly comforting voice through her family’s grief over her brother’s disappearance, a move across continents, the devastating dissolution of her marriage, and the new beginning as a single mother and café owner in Sydney.
Now, two decades after receiving those first pages, Abi is invited to an all-expenses paid weekend retreat to learn “the truth” about the Guidebook. It’s an opportunity too intriguing to refuse. If Everything is Connected, then surely the twin mysteries of the Guidebook and a missing brother must be linked?
What follows is completely the opposite of what Abi expected––but it will lead her on a journey of discovery that will change her life––and enchant readers. Gravity Is the Thing is a smart, unusual, wickedly funny novel about the search for happiness that will break your heart into a million pieces and put it back together, bigger and better than before.
more
I loved this book… Funny, heartbreaking and clever with a mystery at its heart.
You can not be blue, can’t be depressed while reading the special novel, set in Sidney, Australia and peopled with folks you would love to know. Abigail is a special sister, a supportive daughter, a good wife, and an indulgent mom. When the cards fall against her, she antis up and deals again. Self-pity is not on her agenda, though we of lesser internal fortitude would submit to it. I enjoyed the way the Guidebooks lead us through the world as Abi knows it, and help her find diversity and challenges along the way that she would not have otherwise been exposed to.
Oscar is an intrepid soul and the key to the heart of Abi. And the flying lessons are what holds this group of humans together, keeps the spirit of joy at the forefront of their lives. This is a novel you will not want to miss. I am pleased to recommend it to friends and family. It is a book that creates a deep well of satisfaction in your heart. And the need to look at air currents with a different attitude.
I received a free electronic copy of this novel from Netgalley, Jaclyn Moriarty, and HarperCollins Publishers. Thank you all for sharing your hard work with me. I have read this novel of my own volition, and this review reflects my honest opinion of this work.
One of the most magical, different, interesting, likable, lovable, beautiful, sad, lovely, immensely uplifting books I have ever read… An instant classic.
‘Gravity is the Thing’ follows Abigail, the owner of a Happiness Cafe and single-mother, through her life in the time following her brother’s disappearance at age fifteen. Ever since the year he vanished, she has been receiving chapters of something called ‘The Guidebook’ from a pair of total strangers, offering a unique view on self-help. After years of searching for him, when she is invited to a retreat that offers to give her the book’s ‘truth,’ she can’t help but tie the two events together and go looking for answers.
Once she arrives, instead of finding her brother or immediately unraveling the truth that she’s looking for, she discovers a group of people with whom she joins a sort-of society and forms a strong bond. There is more to ‘The Guidebook’ than she originally suspected and, as the truth comes out, she finds herself deeply hooked in the process.
This book is so deep and thought-provoking that I already feel like I have to re-read it in order to truly absorb everything that it says about self-help, love and grief. For a book so strongly focused on the whimsical and the metaphorical, it is breathtakingly real. The various stories that run alongside each other (of her brother Robert’s disappearance, ‘The Guidebook”s unconventional group sessions, and Abigail’s best efforts to be a good parent to her young son, Oscar) are all incredibly captivating, and I found myself equally invested in all aspects of Abigail’s life.
Although Robert vanished years before the story begins, so we don’t experience his disappearance as though it is a fresh, new wound, we do experience the grief and loss that Abigail has felt for many years through flashbacks, excerpts from her past writings and present day story-telling. Her character has one of the most unique viewpoints and voices I have ever read in fiction and she is such a likeable, relatable character that I feel it would be difficult not to become invested in her journey and emotions.
The other characters too became surprisingly realistic throughout the novel. When we first meet a number of the other characters with whom Abigail grows close, such as Sasha and Pete, I found them to be somewhat one-dimensional and a little like caricatures. This only made it more rewarding for me when they developed to have their own voices, personalities and even side-stories alongside Abigail’s.
I loved this book. It is incredibly heavy in its descriptions of self-love and growth so at times it wasn’t the easiest book to get through, but its message and writing were both so beautiful and poignant that it didn’t come across as though the author was preaching or trying too hard to educate, which I loved. A number of the endorsements for this book describe it as ‘extraordinary’ and ‘an instant classic’ and, honestly, I agree with them completely.
I am absolutely giddy about how much I love this book! I want to fill this space with elated exclamations of what a unique treasure I hold in my hands. It is my new favorite grownup book, and I am immediately recommending it to some reader friends. I am so excited that I actually own this book too. I will be passing it along to all the reading ladies I workout with, but only because I absolutely trust them to circle it back safely to me, because I really, really want to keep and own it. I won it in a Goodreads giveaway and here are a few of the reasons I am so attached. It is absolutely funny! I kept laughing aloud to the point that it felt rude of me to not just go ahead and read the funny parts to my family. Then there were so many funny parts that I felt rude reading so much when my family was actually also in the middle of listening to the radio in our vehicle. It is also heartwarming and insightful and has all these keepers quotes I’ve sat myself down to reread and enjoy once more as I highlighted them in my copy and wrote them in my Keepers book. I won’t ruin them but there’s a description of hope, and also deflated hope. A part about knowing exactly what to do first thing in the morning. A bit about being designed to recover. This book makes me appreciate cake more. It speaks to my heart and memories during all the Oscar dialogue. And the way she reveals things is lovely aha after aha, raised eyebrows, open-mouthed and hopping up from your situation. Then it’s right back down, turning the page and enjoying. I even read this book while eating my meals, which the self-help books tell you absolutely not to do:-) and I (almost) never do. I can’t wait until I am no longer the only one I know who has experienced reading this book!
I tried so very hard to like Gravity Is the Thing. I really did. I forced myself to push on even though I’m a huge advocate of there are too many good reads to force yourself to finish one that doesn’t keep you interested. Why? Robert. I wanted to know what happened to Robert.
I did like the character of Abigail and really thought Oscar was wonderful. I could have read an entire book filled with Oscar and his amusing yet dry, solemn statements.
I felt there was too much about the Guidebook and those bits were thrown in at odd times which served to throw me off. There never seemed to be a rhythm to this story and at about 25% I was already wanting to quit reading, but I kept hoping it would get better.
The author did a great job with Abigail and Oscar and I hate to leave a bad review, but I read an ARC from Netgalley (thanks to the publishers and author as well as Netgalley) and I do feel I should review it.
If you have read this author’s YA books and enjoyed them, you may like this book. I’ve this novel compared to her sister’s work so if you like Liane Moriarty, this book may very well work for you. If you’re considering it, give it a shot. This seems to be (from reading other reviews) either a book you really enjoy or you just don’t. There doesn’t seem to be a lot of middle ground.