SUCH A BEAUTIFUL FAMILY

3 stars out of 5

I had high hopes for this story, if for no other reason than I'm a fan of other works I've read by this author. But while I read it eagerly from start to finish, most of my attention centered on the hope that the three main adult characters would stop behaving like children and there would be a bang-up surprise ending. Alas, neither happened. The only character who had both common sense and intelligence, in fact, was a boy who had way too much of both to be believable at his newbie-teen age. And the ending? A ho-hum resolution, leaving me with the feeling that nothing much really changed from the beginning to the end.

Here's the gist: Nora Harmon has a wonderful husband, two growing-up-fast children and a successful career. Out of the blue, she's contacted by Jane Bell, the owner of a whiz-bang software company, who makes Nora an offer of employment she can't refuse (never mind that any sensible person would have done exactly that, at least until the "too good to be true" sound of it was debunked by facts). Very soon, it becomes clear that Jane is at the very least emotionally needy; there's nothing she won't do, it seems, to solidify her relationship with Nora and make Nora's family hers - and that includes lying through her teeth.

It also becomes clear that Nora and her aging parents have been hiding a dark secret - and her attempts to justify never telling her supportive husband David nor their children Hailey and Trevor left me shaking my head. Still another turn-off is that despite some serious misgivings, Nora also manages to justify Jane's attempts to ingratiate herself into the family, even when it's clear they're doing more harm than good.

Of course, it doesn't take readers long to figure out that Jane may have an ulterior motive, and not much longer to figure out what it is. From that point on, it's just a matter of when (or if) Nora - or anyone else in the family besides Trevor, who as I mentioned earlier somehow managed to end up with the brains of the family - figures out what Jane's really up to. The result for me is that while the book is well written and definitely held my attention throughout, overall it was a bit disappointing. Thanks to the publisher, via NetGalley, for the opportunity to read and review a pre-release copy.

Such a Beautiful Family by T.R. Ragan (Thomas & Mercer, November 2022); 266 pp.