Cover Image: French Braid

French Braid

Pub Date:   |   Archive Date:

Member Reviews

Reliably detailed, Anne Tyler tells a family story spanning generations. The realism is there — it reads like a true family history, with the regular day-to-day being what impacts us.

Was this review helpful?

This was my first Anne Tyler book but I bet it won’t be my last. . I like her narrative arcs, spanning multiple generations, and how she depicts their interactions. She has a great eye for detail and spot-on insights sShe infuses her stories with a lot of warm humor and gentle wit. I have added her earlier books on my wish list for my future reads.

Was this review helpful?

French Braid by Anne Tyler was the first of Tyler's books that I have experienced. The story revolves around the Garrett family from the 1950's until the present day. And that is sadly it. I did enjoy reading about the day to day happenings but I was waiting for something big to happen. Nothing did. People were married, people had kids, kids went to school, mom found herself, kids went off to school, kids got married, grandkids were born....... It was all very mundane, normal happenings. I will say, Tyler has a way with words and makes the normal, mundane happenings interesting. She kept me interested and reading until the very end. If you are looking for twists and turns in a story, this isn't for you. I would recommend French Braid to others and would love to read other works by Anne Tyler. 3.5 stars for me.
#FrenchBraid #NetGalley

Was this review helpful?

This is a novel about the Garrett family in the 1950's until the present. Mercy is an artist, married to Robin who lives for tools and projects. They have three children. Alice is the oldest and does a lot of the cooking and child care when Mercy is caught up in a project. Lily is the middle child, cute and always ready to meet another guy. David is the youngest by quite a bit.
When the children grow up and leave home, so does Mercy. She never comes out and tells Robin she is leaving but rents a garage apartment to use as a studio and starts sleeping there more and more. Alice has married a man as steady as she is. Lily had a quick first marriage and then met and married a man who the family likes. David doesn't marry for years and when he does it is to a woman a decade older than him with a child.

Anne Tyler is known for her writing about family relationships. Most of her books are centered around Baltimore where she also lives and this one is part of that tradition. The Garretts learn how to accept family members that are different than what they think is 'normal' and to support each other regardless of choices. Tyler's novels have won a Pulitzer Prize and been nominated multiple times for both the Booker and the Women's Prize for Fiction. She is a natural treasure and readers will enjoy her comforting books. This book is recommended for literary fiction readers.

Was this review helpful?

This book is a powerful and moving family saga that addresses connections and relationships. I enjoyed it, but I don't know that it's a book that I'd rush to recommend to others as a must-read. I enjoy Anne Tyler as an author, but her books are calm and evenly paced, with more gentle twists and turns. Readers who are looking for shocking twists or fast-paced actions should look elsewhere.

Was this review helpful?

I received a free ARC from NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.

I really liked this book. I don’t even know how to express why, I just did. I think the characters all seemed very real and genuine. I liked the family history and how it lead to the current family structure.

Was this review helpful?

My first Anne Tyler book. A winner. I love the characters. The story is a family saga of unexpected turns in their lives. Most outstanding.

Was this review helpful?

I love a good family saga. Coming in at a relatively short 8 chapters, this story of the Garrett family covers three generations of Baltimoreans from 1940 through 2020. There is a constant undercurrent of misunderstanding and bafflement from one family member to the other. They love one another but don’t much like one another. This story explores typical Anne Tyler themes like the late-in-life search for one’s independence, family loyalty, and the connections - or braids - that tie families together whether they’re aware of it or not. I think this is my favorite Anne Tyler book so far. This is not a heavily plotted book, but Tyler’s sympathetic and insightful prose creates a satisfying resolution. ARC from NetGalley and Knopf Doubleday.

Was this review helpful?

I love Anne Tyler's storytelling so I knew I had to read this book. I was not proven wrong! It was great. This was such an extravagant story told in not so many pages. It was amazing all the way through.

Was this review helpful?

I had a hard time keeping focus with this book. There were so many characters and at times I couldn't connect how people were related to each other. I didn't like the different perspectives and not knowing who the narrator was until we got into it. And I didn't really feel any connection with any of the characters.

Was this review helpful?

What a spectacular book! Every time I pick up an Anne Tyler book I wonder if she'll be able to wrap me up in her spell yet again. Why am I somewhat skeptical? I don't know. Her voice is so captivating and makes me feel secure from the first page. Is it that I look back and wonder if her books were sentimental in retrospect? This might be it, and it's a shame because I find her stories so heartfelt and emotional. I never, while reading them, feel like I'm being manipulated.

Was this review helpful?

What Anne Tyler always delivers is characters that feel incredibly real and a book full of keen observations of human nature. French Braid is no exception. I was impressed with how many characters and how much time she was able to pack into a short book. I enjoy character based novels but there wasn't much plot here for me to attach to, so it took longer to get through than I originally anticipated. It's gorgeously written and I think captures the intricacy and intimacy of family very well, but it wasn't one I felt compelled to keep reading or constantly pick up. For me as a reader, I need more plot.

Was this review helpful?

An engrossing story that follows one family from 1959 through present-day pandemic life. Tyler's observations on her characters and they way they interact with each other/the world around them feel so authentic.

Was this review helpful?

I did not get to this book and as a result am removing from my list. I ended up selecting other books to read instead. This review is not a reflection of the story, but rather shows that this was not high on my TBR list, which is a factor in itself.

Was this review helpful?

Anne Tyler’s French Braid is an intimate story of the Garretts, a slightly off-kilter family reminiscent of the Leary family of The Accidental Tourist. The Garrett’s are an unorthodox sort of family, loving each other at arms length but never demonstratively, sometimes not liking each other, but making it work. Mercy and Robin, matriarch and patriarch of the clan, are raising their children without overseeing them. They leave that job to their eldest, Alice, a young girl thrust into a parental role once she realized no one else held the title. Alice did her best to care for her sister Lily, the wild middle child, and David, the odd little boy.
Although not always likable protagonists, I found myself rooting for everyone throughout the book., not wanting to put it down. Now that I’ve finished, I miss these people, which surprises me.
Ms. Tyler is a truly original storyteller, and I find myself aways drawn to her books.

Was this review helpful?

I really wish we could give 1/2 stars so I could give this 3 1/2 vs 3 stars since I went back and forth btwn a 3 and a 4. Overall it wasn’t my normal type of read, with a slow paced seeming storyline and a very introspective detailed family lens that usually may be better suited for a tv series or movie, however it took a sharp unexpected turn towards the end that I didn’t care for but then suddenly redeemed itself with some of its takeaways and emotional family memory nostalgia in the end. I think for perhaps a certain audience this could be a 4 star, but for myself it’s a 3 - could see it being mixed reviews based on audience demographics and preferred reading genres.

Was this review helpful?

Didn’t particularly love this one. I liked all the characters but I wished it tied together more. It never really made sense to me why the son was so estranged. Or the beginning when the granddaughter sees her cousin and barely recognizes him despite doing so much together as families when they were young. I guess I was waiting for a bomb to drop as to why they had no relationship as adults but nothing really came of it.

Was this review helpful?

Thanks to NetGalley for the ecopy for my Kindle.
The dramas and ups and downs of a family when the "nest becomes empty." The mother decides to "do her own thing." The father just tries to please his wife. In all, it was an interesting story about what may happen in a family and the different directions each one takes.

Was this review helpful?

3.5 stars rounded up. I read this multi-timeline story of misfit family members in a single afternoon. It's pretty remarkable how it held my attention even with a pretty obvious lack of plot. The characters puzzled me—mostly in a good way—but the writing style made this cozy novel easy to read. If you want to read a book where a lot of twists and turns happen, this isn't for you. But if you want to read about the inner workings of a relatable family throughout the decades, this could suit you.

Was this review helpful?

Unfortunately this book wasn’t for me. I just found it not my type of read and I sadly struggled through it.

Was this review helpful?