I was pretty underwhelmed when I finished this - but picking apart some themes and the message has given me a new respect for Patchett’s storytelling!

Discusses so much about how we can get addicted to memory , how we can fetishise being the victim to justify privilege , how as children we frame our lives through stories and people as tropes to grow up and see the nuances more clearly , how we hold women more accountable for absence in childhood , how we view women in reductive tropes like adoring mother/dutiful daughter/ lonely spinster/ evil stepmother

I really disliked Danny - but I found maeve was the moral compass of the book and the most interesting character by far

Mild spoilers I also loved the end when Danny catches May having a cigarette , when the original family made their money on tobacco, shows an inevitability in the gravitational pull of the house, how it can be a site of painful and fond memories at once and how our pasts have the room for that complexity

This is many books in one - will probably read more of her work ! Not a major new favourite was pretty strong and consistent but it lacked fun and the zany edge of youth that the goldfinch had