Nine Perfect Strangers by Liane Moriarty
Written by Ashley Kelmore, Posted in Reviews
Four Stars
Best for:
People who like Liane Moriarty books.
In a nutshell:
Nine people arrive at a health retreat looking for change. They find a little more than that.
Worth quoting:
“The first was a woman … wearing an oversized, brand-new-looking whit t-shirt that hung almost to her knees over black leggings, the standard outfit for an average-sized woman who starts a new exercise program and thinks her perfectly normal body should be hidden.”
Why I chose it:
I have been waiting for this to come out in paperback and huzzah! It was worth the wait, as I picked it up at lunch yesterday and haven’t put it down much since.
Review:
Liane Moriarty has a formula – there are multiple characters, and while some are leads, there isn’t usually just one perspective shared. Usually these books go back and forth in time, but not this time. This time we get a fairly straightforward narrative from the perspective of a dozen characters, though Frances, a 50-something author, is the one we keep going back to.
Frances’s latest book has been rejected by her publisher, and she was scammed by an online love. She needs some change and so seeks it from a ten-day retreat that ends up including some questionable methods that increase in absurdity.
As always with Liane’s books there are things that you think you’ve got figured out and then she hits you with a curve. Her writing is engaging and her character development is strong here. I especially appreciated the way we got the sense of how people come across as compared to how they are feeling inside. I genuinely look forward to her books, and this one was worth the wait.
Keep it / Pass to a Friend / Donate it / Toss it:
Donate it
