“A heart-wrenching page-turner told with warmth and humor.”—People Magazine (Pick of the Week) “A rich testament to the power of second chances.”—Women’s WorldA Publishers Weekly and USA Today Bestseller!From the New York Times bestselling author of Good Luck with That comes a new novel about a blue-blood grandmother and her black-sheep granddaughter who discover they are truly two sides of … black-sheep granddaughter who discover they are truly two sides of the same coin.
Emma London never thought she had anything in common with her grandmother Genevieve London. The regal old woman came from wealthy and bluest-blood New England stock, but that didn’t protect her from life’s cruelest blows: the disappearance of Genevieve’s young son, followed by the premature death of her husband. But Genevieve rose from those ashes of grief and built a fashion empire that was respected the world over, even when it meant neglecting her other son.
When Emma’s own mother died, her father abandoned her on his mother’s doorstep. Genevieve took Emma in and reluctantly raised her–until Emma got pregnant her senior year of high school. Genevieve kicked her out with nothing but the clothes on her back…but Emma took with her the most important London possession: the strength not just to survive but to thrive. And indeed, Emma has built a wonderful life for herself and her teenage daughter, Riley.
So what is Emma to do when Genevieve does the one thing Emma never expected of her and, after not speaking to her for nearly two decades, calls and asks for help?
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“People are complicated”, which pretty much describes this book. It is a poignant story of how different people deal with tragedy and adversity, some rising to the challenges and some sinking into the muck.
Genevieve London’s beloved older son, Sheppard disappeared on a camping trip with his father and baby brother Clark. Sheppard was only seven and Clark three (who takes a three year old on a camping trip?). Neither she nor her husband, Garrison ever recovered and Clark was neglected. Garrison died a few years later and in order to cope, Genevieve created her own fashion empire. Clark is a spoiled, but lost his soul. He meets April in Chicago and quickly marries her, but he also lies about his work and when Emma is born, he is gone most of the time. April sunk into depression and decided Emma would be better of without her, but Clark is late coming home, so it is eight year old Emma who finds the body. Clark takes Emma to live with his mother, who is unable to show her granddaughter that she loves her. But Emma is looking for someone to love her and finds out right after graduation that she is pregnant. Genevieve sees all Emma’s potencial about to be wasted, so gives her a choice of aborting the baby, giving it up for adoption, or leaving. Emma choses number 3 and goes back to Chicago to live with her maternal grandfather. Seventeen years later, she has put herself through school and has a PhD in psychology and her daughter, Riley, is a very well adjusted high school junior, when Genevieve calls, telling Emma she is dying and would like to meet Riley, promising an inheritance that would pay her college expenses. These are just the main characters, with so many more characters that are just as developed and interesting, messed up but contribute so much to the story. The summer proves a time for some healing and changes in family dynamics. There is also a wonderful chapter the so accurately describes how it feels to be getting for a woman. Wonderful read.
Great story. Great cast of characters. I loved how we got all these different perspectives. The personalities of each character were so vivid! Loved how we got to see the hardships people live through affected by the suicide of a loved one. There were moments in this book that had me in literal tears, moments of pure terror. You’ll know what I’m talking about when you read it yourself!! Moments of honesty, very real and raw. Another well-done read from Kristan Higgins.
Thanks to Kristen Higgins for a great story about women. This book is about four generations of women and the events that shaped their lives. It is also about loving and not being able to show to someone that you do love them. It is also about dying and not wanting to be alone. I like that this book tells the story from the view point of several people who gives us a background on the events that shaped their lives. Life and Other Inconveniences lets us know that it is never to late to forgive someone for past hurts and to tell them you love them.
I really enjoyed this book! The characters were realistic and they faced situations we can all relate too. The love and faith they had in each other was heart warming.
Kristan Higgins is one of my top all time favorite authors. I absolutely love that she is now writing Women’s Fiction, but hasn’t lost the comedic romance in the process.
This book was a multi-generational exploration of family and it’s ups and downs. The story includes an older woman, one in her late thirties, a teenager and also a female toddler (world’s most horrendous) from another family.
This is a book of love–very strong love, withheld love, romantic love, love that breaks your heart to pieces and love that sneaks up on you and is there even when you don’t know it. There are also dogs, death, lies and betrayal..and the worst first date in the history of mankind. Ms. Higgins has woven all that into a miraculous book that leaves you in awe and bewildered all at the same time. A must read!
I have learned that Kristen Higgins’ books are always going to surprise me. I don’t mean that they are mystery books, I mean that from one to the next you never know where she will take me.
Life and Other Inconveniences is not a light hearted love story. It is the story of family dynamics in a family that was broken when the oldest son disappears when he is seven. It is the story of the other son and his mother’s inability to love him after losing her favorite son and then her beloved husband shortly after and it is the story of Emma, the granddaughter she raised and then abandoned when Emma gets pregnant at 18. It is the story of Riley, Emma’s 16 year-old daughter and a summer trip to finally meet her great-grandmother who is dying.
I am a fan of this author and I love listening to her audio books. Her narrators always seem to end up being my favorites. This book has more than one narrator to cover the characters. It works very well.
The story is one of survival and perseverance and what happens in the aftermath of tragedy that can ruin a life or make you stronger. I highly recommend the story and the audio book too. I couldn’t stop listening.
Kristan takes us on a journey through tragedies of the past, mistakes and prideful missed opportunities that create scars and pain for a family through decades into an uncertain future. It’s a novel of love, forgiveness, and the beauty in believing in second chances. Kristan has the unique ability to tell a story filled with sadness in a humorous and engaging way that doesn’t allow the reader to stop turning pages. Another wonderful read!!
Kristan Higgins has become a must-buy author for me. I have been looking forward to this book for some time. I tried to preorder it several times! When it finally came I was so excited. I could not put it down. It was late, I had work in the morning, but I did not want to quit reading. I finally did and read it in two sittings instead of the one I wanted.
Ms. Higgins is so good at describing dysfunctional families. The relationships between the protagonist and her grandmother, who raised her for ten years then kicked her out when she was a pregnant teen-ager, the relationship with the baby’s dad, and her friendships are all unique and well described. As Emma comes to forgive Gigi we understand. With her, we realize that Jason has been there for the child but he didn’t really give anything up. All these complicated relationships become real to us. I enjoyed this book and all the story lines it contained.
Ms. Higgins writes books that are more serious than the typical romance book. If you are looking for a bit of light fluff stay far away. But if you want to care deeply about the characters, and if you want to have to think about the consequences of their actions, this is a book for you!
This is an amazing book. Each character is complete and has a unique voice. The writing is superb. I highly recommend this book.
You can never go wrong with a Kristan Higgins book. In Life and Other Inconveniences, she continues her departure from romance and delves deeper into women’s fiction, writing about abandonment, death, and illness. While some prefer stories with more serious subjects, I do hope Higgins returns to her more light-hearted, entertaining romance novels. No matter the genre, her books are always full of excellent writing and well-rounded characters.
Family. It’s wonderful, but it’s also complicated.
This story is completely engrossing.
It’s an emotional rollercoaster ride.
Beautiful and gut wrenching. A long multi generational tale that sucked me in and held me entranced until the final page. I highly recommend it. I loved it.
Yeah, so much for my plans for a productive afternoon … Higgins came through again with another impossible-to-put-down story of family, forgiveness, and redemption. I’m now a very happy wreck.
Graceful, nuanced, and moving!
Life and Other Inconveniences is a beautifully written, affecting story that immerses you into the lives of the London family, especially three strong, determined women, and all the secrets, wounds, smiles, tears, strength, and compassion that surround them.
The prose is effortless and expressive. The characters are authentic, angry, lovable, and stubborn. And the story is an exceptionally touching tale about life, loss, love, grief, forgiveness, familial drama, friendship, courage, hope, and the unbreakable ties that bind us as family.
Overall, Life and Other Inconveniences is another absorbingly insightful, skillfully plotted, multi-generational, family saga by Higgins that reminds us that life is complicated, messy, challenging, short, heartbreaking, as well as all those other wonderful things, lovely times, and special moments that happen in-between.
Higgins is a mastermind of family dynamics in this poignant novel about two different generations of women struggling to find common ground. I couldn’t put it down!
Life and Other Inconveniences is a beautiful story of growth and forgiveness. Kristan Higgins has turned her writing style more towards the serious and heavy side of things, but you won’t be disappointed! The secondary characters are the best part of the book and will stay with you even after you’ve finished reading. A wonderful story, especially if you’re a Gilmore Girls fan!
Life and Other Inconveniences is an amazing and emotional story that is pure Kristan Higgins; you can hear her voice through the words. This story features family and friends who have dealt with loss, love, death, and family dynamics, made me laugh, cry, and be empathetic for the various characters. We get a peek of how each person dealt with loss, pain, grief, new loves, babies, and/or unexpected events. This story dealt with people forgiving others or finding forgiveness within their heart. Then there was family love shown in varying degrees from “I love you because you are my child” to “I don’t mean to smother you but I need to protect you” and those in between. There’s mother and child love, grandmother and orphaned child, widowed father and a devil-child, unconditional love, as well as love between two people possibly in love. There is also the growth of the characters through a summer of ups, downs, lies, truth, as well as all sorts of other unexpected events and feelings.
Ms. Higgins wrote a story that reflects family dynamics which many readers can relate to. Reading this story was like being in a room with the characters, each taking a turn to tell their version of their story; each chapter is the voice of a different character, talking and clarifying their point of view or memory. I wondered whether or not it was cathartic for the character, sharing their memories, feelings, and pain.
Ms. Higgins wrote an amazing and emotional story that is not to be missed. In typical Higgins fashion, mixed with the teary emotional portions are humorous situations that brought out laughs and smiles. She provided a tale rich with family dynamics, amusing banter, and other endearing characters throughout this story. I highly recommend Life and Other Inconveniences to other readers.
I voluntarily reviewed a complimentary copy of this book, provided by the publisher.
Life and Other Inconveniences is a stunning exploration of the ways in which tragedy and the grief that ensues have the power to inform choices and transform lives, the resilience that comes from determination, and the importance of resolution and forgiveness.
Emma London is thirty-five years old and has struggled mightily to build a life for herself and Riley, a sometimes sullen sixteen-year-old. They live with Emma’s maternal grandfather in a Chicago suburb. Emma toiled in a local grocery store while she pursued her studies and raised Riley. Although it took her a decade, she earned three degrees and her career as a psychologist is getting off the ground. Since learning she was pregnant, Emma’s life has revolved solely around Riley, whose father, Jason, has steadily provided child support but little else. Emma’s dreams of marrying Jason and creating a home for their child gradually dimmed as, rendered homeless by her grandmother’s cruelty, she was taken in by Paul. Jason’s plan to attend college was not, unlike Emma’s, derailed. He graduated and ended up marrying the glamorous and successful Jamilah, with whom he has two sons.
After Emma’s departure, Genevieve did what she always does. She carried on in her stately Connecticut home, Sheerwater, in tony Stoningham, Connecticut, surrounded by her live-in housekeeper and companion, Donelle; completely inept cook, Helga; and Charles, her driver. Now eighty-five years old, she sits on numerous boards and committees, and hosts cocktail parties every Friday evening for a small group of friends and neighbors. Stylish, caustic, and brutally frank, Gigi — as only Emma was allowed to call her — does her best to hide the deep sorrow she has carried for more than fifty years since her beloved favorite child, Sheppard, went missing, and Garrison died far too young.
As the story opens, Emma is stunned to hear from Genevieve after seventeen years. And even more surprised by the proposition Genevieve offers her. Claiming that she has been diagnosed with a brain tumor, Genevieve asks Emma to bring Riley and come to Sheerwater to spend time with her before she dies. In exchange for which, she will make Riley her sole heir. While Emma’s integrity is not for sale, she does worry about how she will pay for Emma’s college education given that she has a mountain of student loans to pay off herself, and Jason cannot be counted on to contribute financially. Emma would very much like Genevieve to see what a terrible mistake she made all those years ago when she demanded that Emma either abort her unborn child or place him/her for adoption . . . or be cut off. Riley is a beautiful girl with striking blue eyes and stunning red hair. An honors student with a bright future ahead of her. Thus, Emma, Riley, and Paul — who, thankfully, insists upon accompanying them and providing moral support — head off to Connecticut for the summer.
Higgins effectively relates the story through alternating chapters. Emma, Genevieve, and Riley reveal their pasts and inner dialogues through first-person narratives, while the focus is on Clark and Miller, Jason’s cousin, in third-person narratives. Jason is a handsome forty-year-old widower who is struggling to raise his headstrong, tantrum-prone daughter, Tess, on his own. Higgins’ dialogue is crisp, believable, and often hilarious, particularly concerning the mischief that out-of-control but lovable Tess, a full-fledged three-year-old terror gets into. Miller’s vacillation between devotion to Tess and wishing his stubborn, unruly child had never been born is completely authentic.
While all of Higgins’s characters are credible and endearing, each in his/her frequently eccentric way, it is, surprisingly, Genevieve who grabs the reader’s heartstrings and does not let go. Her description of the losses she has endured, how living with loss has impacted her life and informed her decision-making, the secrets she has kept for so long, and what, in actuality, she has planned is compelling and frequently so searingly painful and raw it is difficult to continue reading. Higgins gradually reveals that the woman who is so sharply critical of others — seemingly lobbing verbal jabs with no awareness of the harm they do to others, much less remorse — has long shone the same critical light upon herself. Despite her outward demeanor, Genevieve is well aware of the ways in which she has failed those she loves. But some people find love and appreciation far more difficult to express than judgment. Higgins imbues Genevieve’s story with grace, compassion, and empathy.
Over the course of the summer, secrets are revealed, bonds are formed, and it becomes clear that the dynamics in some relationships will never change so it is better to move on separately. Life and Other Inconveniences is, at its core, an engrossing story about four generations of women and the ways in which they react to life events. None of them are perfect, there are no heroes, and even Genevieve is not truly the “gorgon” that Emma perceived her to be when she was a young girl growing up with the knowledge that her parents both abandoned her and her grandmother only reluctantly agreed to raise her. Higgins deftly explores the hold that old wounds have over the women and whether they can find a way to heal and move forward. Higgins can be forgiven for some predictable aspects of the tale because her characters are fully developed and memorable, and the story’s themes resonate. Higgins delivers the emotionally satisfying conclusion that makes taking the journey with Emma, Genevieve, Riley, and her fascinating cast of supporting characters worthwhile.
Thanks to NetGalley for an Advance Reader’s Copy of the book.
4.5 stars
Kristan Higgins chooses unexpected family relationships as her focus for this book, and she captivates you in the process.
Emma London, the daughter of a feckless man and an emotionally ill mother who took her life, is the single mother of sixteen-year-old Riley, a precocious child currently being bullied by her so-called friends. Emma and Riley live with Emma’s maternal grandfather, a crusty widower whose love for his girls is deep and unquestioning.
After her paternal grandmother, renowned handbag designer Genevieve London, kicked her out upon her announcement at eighteen of her pregnancy, Emma has done whatever needed to provide for Riley. She had to live with her grandmother because her feckless father didn’t want the burden of caring for her. What Genevieve fails to see is that Emma may have been smart enough to know that getting pregnant in high school may not be the best move, but she’s also a girl desperate to love and be loved. She falls for a rather feckless boy, and she falls harder for her daughter.
Genevieve herself is far more complex than Emma wants to give her credit for being. Her oldest son went missing when he was eight, and for the ensuing fifty-five years, Genevieve has not known whether he is dead or alive. She refers to him as The Missing. Kristan Higgins makes you feel Genevieve’s pain, loss, and horror. Grab some tissues because despite her frostiness, Genevieve will bring you to tears.
Another family featured in this book is that of Miller Finlay, whose construction company has made updates to Genevieve’s sprawling Connecticut mansion. Miller happens to be the cousin of Emma’s feckless baby daddy, and he, too, has suffered great loss. His beloved wife died during childbirth, and their baby Tess, now three, is a terror. For real. She’s the kind of child teenagers ought to have to babysit because she is perfect birth control.
These three people–Genevieve, Emma, and Miller–have heartache in common, yet Genevieve refuses to allow it to bring her closer to Emma. (She kind of does with Miller, as much as Genevieve can let anyone in.) There is one moment in this book when Emma quite plainly tells her grandmother that all she ever wanted was to be loved, and it will crack you wide open.
Emma and Riley, along with Emma’s grandfather, come back to Connecticut when Genevieve beckons them. I loved that Emma not only was open to Genevieve having a relationship with Riley, she supported and encouraged it. Seeing her daughter with her grandmother brings Emma joy, which makes you like her all the more. You won’t always like Genevieve, even as you sympathize with her. She’s so determined to stiff-upper-lip everything that she blinds herself to the gift of family she’s been given–for a third time, in fact.
This book feels different from other Kristan Higgins books. Yes, it has her warmth and humor, but there is a sadness in Genevieve, Emma, and Miller that pervades nearly every page. Even Emma’s grandfather has a sadness about him. These people need to heal, and you aren’t always certain that Genevieve’s mansion is where that can happen. Yet this home, so large and stuffed with more rooms than necessary, also proves to have an intimacy that provokes emotional connection.
Dear reader, I cried. Several times, in fact. I always cry in Kristan Higgins’s books, but this one packed a stronger wallop. I absolutely loved it. The only reason I can’t give it five stars is that one plot point is tied up a little too neatly and conveniently at the end of the book, and it feels somewhat false. It feels like a minor quibble in the face of such a tremendous book. And make no mistake, this is a tremendous book.
This book was not my usual read, but I did enjoy it and found it deeply compelling. Each chapter is from a different person’s point of view, which to me is both interesting and little hard to read. The characters were very real and their lives were not to be lived by the faint of heart. This book definitely pulled on a lot of my emotional strings, which is always a good thing. I felt sorry for so many of the characters and for all that they suffered through, but then again none of us are promised an easy life. I noticed a couple of parallels between this story and events in my own life and I hope that perhaps mine will work out the way that theirs did.
I won an ARC of this book in a Goodreads giveaway. All thoughts and opinions are my own.
Lindas Book Obsession Reviews “Life and Other Inconveniences” by Kristan Higgins, Berkley, August 2019
WOW! Kristan Higgins, Author of “Life and Other Inconveniences” has written an intriguing, riveting, emotional, dramatic, entertaining and thought-provoking novel. The Genres for this novel are Fiction, and Women’s Fiction. The timeline for this story is set in the present and goes to the past when it pertains to the characters or events in this story. The author describes her colorful and dramatic cast of characters as quirky, dysfunctional, complex, and complicated. I love that there are some dogs in this story as well.
Emma London is a single Mom and has done a great job raising her 16-year-old daughter Riley while working jobs and going to school. Emma has had a hard life with abandonment issues from several family members. Emma’s grandmother did take her in for years, when she was a child but when Emma got pregnant, threw her out to fend for herself. It certainly is quite surprising that Emma gets a call now from her Grandmother, Genevieve London, requesting that Emma return to her home, Sheerwater. This is the uber-wealthy Genevieve London, responsible for the top designer handbag line.
Emma is ambivalent of what she should do, but Riley would really like to meet her Grandmother. Emma’s Pop who has always been in her life is ready to go with them. It would bring them closer to Riley’s father, who leaves nearby.
I appreciate that the author discusses the importance of family, decent moral values, understanding, compassion, communication, forgiveness, love and hope. Sometimes situations are not what they seem to be, and sometimes even mean spirited people can surprise you. What is the motivation for making people do the things that they do? This is also a coming of age novel. I would highly recommend this thought-provoking novel and emotional novel.