Wellness is one of those books that’s about everything and nothing - focused on the minutiae of life, and how all those small things add up to large things with far reaching consequences. It’s a deep character study of a married couple navigating the obstacles of middle age while confronting their ingrained traumas of childhood.
It meanders from peak 90s city living in Chicago (which my GenX Chicagoan, nostalgia loving self appreciated immensely), to a farm conducting controlled prairie fires in Kansas, to the 19th century beginnings of a robber baron family.
I think that some readers may be put off by the scope of the novel that moves away from and eventually back to the two main characters, but I found it illuminating. I also found the scientific dissection of love and happiness rather fascinating and that’s where the deep dives should have ended. What kept me from going full five stars was all of the other, obviously well researched, topics the author tried to pack into the story - I could especially do without the mind numbing details about social media algorithms. Though Hill tried to pack a little bit too much into this, I still found it to be a worthwhile read!