[b:Flight: A Novel|60254211|Flight A Novel|Lynn Steger Strong|https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1659418745l/60254211._SY75_.jpg|90811528] by [a:Lynn Steger Strong|14036081|Lynn Steger Strong|https://images.gr-assets.com/authors/1444436677p2/14036081.jpg] was a good domestic novel of three grown children and their spouses and children gathering for Christmas now that the matriarch, Helen, has died. They try to maintain old customs and some are more entrenched in family memories than others, a couple are artists, each has concerns of their own. Most rue the mother's passing. There are mishaps and challenges with the five children present, and the last quarter of the book steps up the pace considerably when a child is missing in a snowstorm. At that point, it went from a three-star up to a four-star for me. I thought the writing admirable with a nice balance of scene and dialogue plus introspection. In the beginning with six adults and a neighbor, I struggled to keep track of who was married to who, made their living doing what and who had which kids. I put notes in the front of the book to guide me. Kate, whose mother has died, remembers her: "But she's the only person in the world who ever saw me the way she saw me, who loved me like that, who remembered me as all the things I'd ever been and also thought of me as all the things she still thought I might become...It feel harder--fucking terrifying--that there is no longer any person in the world who loves me like she did." A poignant sketch of mothering and mother loss. ( )

Excellent book. Mother dies and children and spouses meet for Christmas. Interesting families ( )

Well-written, a laudable effort to explore the various manifestations of grief when the death of a strong and beloved matriarch leaves adult children with no center of gravity. There was a timely side dish of the celebration of the recognition of privilege. I was sort of bored though, and I mostly did not care about the story and the characters in it. No . . . that is wrong . . . I entirely did not care about the story or the characters in it. ( )

Three adult siblings and their families meet up for the holidays after the death of their mother. They are all ambivalent about the time together, in the absence of the woman who held the family together. There are tensions between siblings, between spouses and between the various in-laws, all of which simmer under the surface of the routine festivities, where the burden of childcare is not equally shared and the question of what to do with their mother's house is a divisive issue.

This novel feels like something that could have been written by Anne Tyler or Elizabeth Strout, with its focus on family dynamics and how they play out when not all members of an extended family like each other that much. It's a well-written story and the family dynamics feel very real. At the same time, some of the characters were given less space than they needed to be fully realized and while the resolution was executed well, I didn't entirely buy the sudden changes of heart at the end. ( )

The premise is familiar: three adult children gather at Christmas to discuss their inheritance after their mother passes away. They are all married with their own neurotic issues, but I love the realistic descriptions of the different ways people grieve and parent and connect. Each couple has their own struggles & frustrations with how life has turned out.

The descriptions of the bird artwork was a great fit for me since I’ve fallen in love with bird watching at our new home.

“For a while parenting brought her and Kate closer but then Tess begin to worry about Kate’s kids influence the chaos of them up close made her afraid.” ( )