One family, many stories. A non-spoiler review of bestselling author Emily Henry’s latest novel about love, loss, and plenty of melodrama
Hello and happy Wednesday everyone! As I type this, I’m looking out my window into a gorgeously bright and sunny Florida day, all the while knowing how deceptive it is, because it is 47°F. Now I know what you’re thinking: “Forty-seven degrees?? Get out of here, that’s not very cold.” Ah yes, I thought the same thing when I first moved here, because I myself am from Oregon. We know our cold! Sure, it’s not Michigan, but I’m used to the dreary, soggy days of winter in the Pacific Northwest. But here? When it dips below 50°F it’s pandemonium. Everyone’s fruit and veggie plants die! Iguanas fall out of trees! It is bitingly cold, and I’ve quickly found out that 47°F in Oregon is vastly different from 47°F in Florida. People say it’s because of the humidity, but what do I know? I hear that word, I think of heat, not cold! But I digress.
Although I do want to mention how amusing it is, the way Floridians “measure” things. When iguanas fall out of trees, it’s too cold and you gotta bring your plants inside! If Waffle House is closed, you know it’s gonna be a bad hurricane and you better batten those hatches down. Things can be bad down here (gestures broadly to the current political landscape), but it’s important to find the humor in life.
Anyway! I have my hot cup of coffee, I have my doggies lying down next to my feet, and I am ready to talk about my latest read, “Great Big Beautiful Life” by the queen of chick-lit, Emily Henry.
But first, a synopsis: “Great Big Beautiful Life” follows aspiring biographer Alice Scott, a magazine writer whose dream job is to write a book about the life of Margaret Ives, heiress to a vast media empire and “America’s Princess”. Unfortunately, no one’s seen or heard from Margaret in over 20 years. When Alice finally tracks the octogenarian down to get her story, Margaret surprisingly agrees to meet with her, but there are conditions. Alice has one month to convince Margaret that she’s the one for the job, because Margaret invited another writer to compete for the chance to write her story: Pulitzer-prize winning biographer Hayden Anderson.
Not to be dismayed, Alice meets with Margaret to get not just her life story, but the story of the entire Ives family, which has many secrets and many tragedies that have stemmed from the beginning. Alice tries hard to focus solely on Maragret, but she can’t deny the chemistry between herself and Hayden. It’s something she could push aside, if it weren’t for Hayden feeling it too…
My star rating: 5 out of 5 melodramatic stars.
I am in no way ashamed to say that this was a fun and engaging read from beginning to end. I found all of the characters intriguing and felt their happiness or tragedy through the pages. I think the big thing that was interesting to me was something internal: If I had read this book during a different time of my life, I don’t think I would’ve liked it.
I don’t want to put any spoilers for the book, so this may be a rather thin review about what actually happens in the novel. There are a few twists and turns, and there’s a big bombshell at the end. While I was expecting some last-minute twist, I wasn’t expecting that one.
The main protagonist, Alice Scott, is one that, I feel, if I were reading at a different time of my life I would’ve hated and be the reason to DNF the book completely. She’s a very optimistic person, and while that’s a lovely trait to have, it can be irritating to many readers, so I can see why people wouldn’t like Alice, myself included. But during my reading it felt very refreshing. Probably because of the current state of the country I live in, I really needed some optimism and positivity. Alice gave that to me, and I appreciated it.
Hayden balances that optimism out (at first) by being introduced as the “grumpy” to Alice’s “sunshine”, but over the course of the book it’s quickly apparent that he’s not grumpy at all really. I think a gripe I have about this book is that I wish I could’ve been in Hayden’s head as well. The book is written mostly in Alice’s POV – with the exception of the chapters where we kind of “delve in” to Margaret’s story and become a sort of “omniscient” reader with the POV of characters set in the past. For example, Emily Henry writes the growing love stories and tragedies of Margaret’s ancestors in third person, but still in their POV’s. We “jump into the past” with them, if you will. It’s very apparent when this happens and it’s a nice touch. It can be a bit tough to believe sometimes though, like, “How could you possibly know exactly what your great-grand-uncle said in this exact moment?” but I could suspend that level of disbelief for the story, so it didn’t bother me.
Anyway, back to Hayden. At first he’s annoyed because he thought he had the biography in the bag, but when he arrives and meets Alice he’s annoyed to have to “compete” for it. But the annoyance seems to disappear rather quickly because he becomes almost fascinated with Alice and her bubbly personality. She lights him up, and it’s fun to see as the story continues.
Their romance isn’t over-the-top passionate by any means. It was almost wholesome and loving and I could feel the yearning – as short as it was. (Their “competition” to win the biography took place over the course of a month, so yes, a short courtship.) Their relationship felt refreshing and it was like a balm on my soul.
The story of the Ives family that Margaret tells is so ridiculous and melodramatic that many readers could end up being alienated, annoyed, or frustrated. I can see that; how can one family go through so much? How can they have so much pain and suffering and drama and shocking moments? And the whole idea of the family being “cursed?” Isn’t that kind of insane? A cursed family; a family that is described in the novel as being “America’s Royal Family -”
Oh. Huh, maybe it can be true.
Yes, the parallels between the Ives family and the Kennedys was obvious. Mysterious deaths, questionable schemes to make millions, secret affairs, I can go on. We as a society consume – to this day! – many books and documentaries and stories about the Kennedys, so it would make sense that the Ives family in this world would be looked at the same way. Emily Henry writes an intriguing story for the Ives family, and I was invested. The family is very gray in many aspects, but that’s what kept me hooked. Alice walked into Margaret’s house, fully intending to get her story, but Margaret wanted to tell the family’s story. It set the tone, hearing about how the Ives family fortune started, stemming from Margaret’s great-grandfather and how he created the family fortune all the way down to Margaret herself, with a few uncles, aunts, and cousins sprinkled in between.
But I felt the anguish of the patriarchs, the decisions they made for either themselves or for their family. I felt the love between them and their “true loves” and how those relationships changed the course of the entire family for decades. How when you’re in a family like the Ives’s you can’t act, think, or be like other families: you are chained to the name and you can’t escape it, no matter how hard you try.
I don’t want to give too much away since I want to keep this spoiler-free, but there is a heartbreaking story about one of the Ives women that is one of the (many) melodramatic moments, but I felt like it fit with that character. On the surface, it’s almost unbelievable and could induce some eye-rolling, but again, I read this book at the right time, and I felt for the woman.
I know there’s always talk with a new Emily Henry book about it being misclassified or whatever, but for some reason I never felt like Emily Henry’s books were traditionally romance like a lot of people believe. And I feel like this comes up every time and there are always readers who get annoyed with it. Emily Henry’s books, to me, were always “women’s lit” first, then “romance”, and even then “romance” can be a more broad genre than we are used to. I read a comment someone made about “Great Big Beautiful Life” and how it shouldn’t be considered a romance because Alice and Hayden are barely in it. But I scratch my head at this. Sure, Alice and Hayden are intermixed in the book between the stories Margaret tells about her family and her life, but there’s so much love and romance in her stories too. Romance doesn’t have to only be about two people and their growing relationship. We saw love bloom between Margaret’s grandparents; her parents; some extended family; then finally, herself. There was a lot of romance in this novel, it was just spread out between many characters. There was also a lot of toxic love and heartbreaking moments in the relationships. But from the first time I read an Emily Henry book, it felt more women’s lit to me. In fact, if I could choose “tropes” or “genres” of her books, it would be “women’s lit,” “beach books,” then “romance.” This book was about two women and their life stories: Alice and figuring out her path in life, wanting to move on from her job as a writer at a magazine to being a full-fledged biographer; Margaret and knowing her life path was near the end and wanting to atone for the choices she’s made in her 80+ years of existence. To be annoyed at this book because there wasn’t enough Alice and Hayden in it would be a disservice. It’s a beautiful story (excuse the pun).
The ending gets a bit wacky, and if the book wasn’t written as wonderfully as it was I would’ve thrown the book at the wall. But when the twist happened I took a breath, laid the book down, and grabbed some water as a sort of micro-break. The twist is one where I would normally quit or roll my eyes and “hate-read” the rest, but I wanted to give the book the benefit of the doubt: I was enchanted by it so far, right? I can’t abandon it now! So I continued on, and while it was still a bit grating, I think it was handled well and when I finished the book it didn’t leave a bad taste in my mouth. It was the “melodrama” of it all, but it was handled well. I think that’s why Emily Henry is so popular.
Okay, I will leave it at that! I greatly enjoyed this book and while “Book Lovers” will always have a soft space in my book-loving soul, “Great Big Beautiful Life” may become its newest roommate.
What did you think about “Great Big Beautiful Life”? Did you like it? Dislike it? Did you throw it at the wall like I wanted to for a split second? How about the debate that seems to surround Emily Henry and her novels? Let me know in the comments, I always love to hear from you.
Until next time, my lovelies!
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