No particular reason for picking this one up – it was just on the shelf and I felt a little light on my library selections that week.
I enjoyed it (NY Times Review). Essentially, the story of a girl who moves back home after some disastrous life choices and tries to figure out the mystery of her paternity.
It had a few things going for it, for me. The girl was an archaeologist (although that barely factors in), the story was peppered with “photographs” of the characters (from the author’s personal collection) and I really liked some of the characters.
What I didn’t love was that while some of the characters were enjoyable, there were sudden changes in personality that I didn’t quite get – or backstory just didn’t add up. Also, and this is more due to my attention span than poor writing – but the author does one of those things, where there is this whole 2nd or 3rd story, told by another generation, sometimes in letters – that just loses me. I admit, I skimmed through entire chapters here. I probably missed something crucial or enjoyable, but I really hate having to entirely switch gears like that. So, I kind of cheated.
Pale Nerd 