Not what I expected, but very enjoyable nonetheless, or maybe because of this. Particularly loved the very subtle way a pivotal moment or event in the plot was referred to in passing, often many decades after we'd left that time period in the narrative... Just a nice, easy but still thought-provoking read.
All that said, I didn't enjoy just how wildly sexist some of the male characters were and also how much was made about Beverly's beauty, like that was the planet around which everything rotated in many ways, and also why was nothing more made of how violent one of the children was when they were little, I felt sure that should have been handled in their adult relationships...