Vacation read #2, and the one I was most looking forward to. Liane Moriarty never disappoints. She creates such relatable, flawed, and lovely characters.
Breezy young parents Sam and Clementine and their Type A friends Erika and Oliver are invited to a barbeque at the home of May/December couple Tiffany and Vid. For some reason this barbeque has gone horribly wrong, and we spend the book sussing out the details of the incident.
In finding out why the incident has been so destructive to these families, we learn their backstories, their struggles in their marriages and friendships, and their hopes and fears for the future. We have 6+ well-written and relatable characters. Because this is inherently a smaller story, it doesn’t feel as fast-paced as some of Moriarty’s other books, but I was totally sucked in.
I had an especially weird take on this book as “the incident” also happened in my family. And, while it has certainly always been explained to me with the requisite horror (I have no memory of it), it didn’t seem to create quite the ripples that it did in this circle of friends. It was very clear to me that the reaction to the incident in Truly Madly Guilty was more about the state of the marriages and friendships prior to those moments. I’m being purposefully cryptic, but if you’ve read it, you can understand what a mindblow it would be for me to hit the climax of this book!
If you’re new to Moriarty I’d recommend starting with What Alice Forgot or Big Little Lies, but if you’re already a fan, I think you’ll love this one too.
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