All We Ever Wanted by Emily Giffin
My rating: 3 of 5 stars
Nina is living a fairy-tale life, far from her middle class beginnings. She has it all; a luxury home, fabulous clothes, upscale events to attend, and her successful husband, Kirk, and their 18 year old son, Finch.
When a photo gets posted to social media involving a passed out, partially exposed student (Lyla) from Finch’s school – along with a racist caption – Nina is shocked to find out her popular, athletically gifted son is the person who did it.
The incident serves to bring to light the flaws in many of the characters in the book. Nina’s husband, Kirk, is mostly unperturbed by what his son did and figures he can throw a little money at the situation to fix it. Finch, says he’s remorseful, then says someone else actually did it, and uses Lyla’s pathetic crush on him to try and escape punishment. Lyla convinces herself that the incident is not that big of a deal, and lies to her father, Tom, some more in the hopes of winning Finch’s affections. Tom, Lyla’s father, says he’s trying to defend his daughter, but often comes off as wanting to teach “those rich people” a lesson,
The main disappointment I had was with Nina. I suppose the premise was to show how she realizes her part in creating a not very person in her son, Finch. But she doesn’t seem to really grasp that occasionally going home for a visit (she comes from a pretty average home) and deigning to stay at her parent’s house, and only really complaining about her husband and son without any real deep discussions with them or acknowledgement that she was also a main driver of the family dynamics, doesn’t turn you into a better person. I felt like she somewhat abandoned her son for being a creep, rather than being a parent and pushing them to be better human beings.
There were some issues dealt with in the book that to me were pretty authentically handled. Lyla not feeling that she was a “victim” and wanting to pursue Finch even after his actions seem what a teenage girl might do.
Finch’s actions and his responses I think are also often how it would happen in real life.
All in all, it was an easy book to read, but I didn’t care for Nina much and that always somewhat lessens the enjoyment for me.
I received an ARC from NetGalley. #AllWeEverWanted #NetGalley
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