Anne Tyler has given us a glimpse into the life of the Garrett family, three generations, they love each other and are bewildered at the same time. Mercy , the mother decides she wants to paint again and starts moving things over to her studio, a little at a time hoping her husband Robin won’t notice. Her children , Alice, Lily and David are grown and living their own lives oblivious to their parents situation, they don’t feel connected to each other but eventually find out they are more connected than they realize. #thefrenchbraid #alfredaknopf #penquinrandomhouse

French Braid by Anne Tyler is an unusual story. The first chapter has Serena and her beau heading back to college after visiting his parents for the first time. They are discussing Serena’s family and how they are not a close-knit unit (she failed to recognize a cousin at the train station). The second chapter goes back in time to 1959 when the Garrett family took their first (and only) vacation. I felt the first chapter was a poor lead into the rest of the book. A prologue set in the present day told from David’s point-of-view would have been a better way to start off French Braid. The rest of the book tells the story of the Garrett family. The characters were not developed. We are told about them, but the are not brought to life. We are not given enough details on any one of the family members. David is the most fleshed out character with Mercy a close second. I did not like Mercy at all. She is a selfish woman who never should have had children. Mercy preferred painting to dealing with her kids. I was shocked (some might consider this a spoiler) when she took the sweet cat and dropped it off at the shelter. She wanted peace restored to her studio (the cat made no noise and did not disturb her). I wish Mercy had taken the cat home to Robin (he would have liked a companion). Robin and Mercy are lucky none of their children were hurt by their lack of attention (especially Lily). They are fortunate that their children turned out to be good parents. The story spans from 1959 through the present day. The story meanders along going from one generation to the next. I felt the pacing was sluggish (snails move faster). I kept hoping something interesting would happen (anything to happen). I did not feel that the story came together as a whole. When I finished French Braid, I was left feeling that I had just wasted three hours of my time. I thought the story was depressing. Near the end, we see how the title ties into the story. It is a strange analogy that I would not see someone from the present day making (maybe in the early 80s when French braids were popular). French Braid was not my kind of book. I failed to get into the story, and I was not a fan of the characters. I had not read a book by Anne Tyler previously which is why I picked up French Braid (I have been trying to expand my horizons). While French Braid was not for me, it will appeal to other readers. I suggest you obtain a sample to see if it is your type of story. French Braid tells us about the Garrett family from Mercy and Robin down through the grandchildren.

French Braid is the story of the Garrett's ranging from the 1950s to current day. The Garrett's are a family of 5 made up of Mercy, the painter mom, Robin, the plumbing store running dad, and children, Alice, Lily, & David. The book starts with a train ride home to Baltimore from Philadelphia where there was a chance run in with a cousin that prompted a conversation about how someone could not be sure that a person was their cousin.

What ensues is the story of this family, the strong personalities, the hidden loving nature of some, and the fraction of one member from the family for mysterious reasons.

French Braid is like most Anne Tyler novels, it is about the people and who they are and not about actions and plot. Now this is not my style of book so I keep reading Tyler novels expecting something different but ending up with a quaint, quite story that is well written.

The story is slow to develop and at midway through, I couldn't find the thread that would get me interested.

Spot On! As I read the French Braid by Anne Tyler that is the description that came to mind when thinking about her characterizations and dialogue. Moving through several decades with one family her insights into the various characters are at once moving and filled with warmth. This is a quintessential Anne Tyler book. One does wonder , however, if many more women will evaluate their lives as they move into the latter third and wonder if perhaps they should have followed their dreams and passions instead of opting for the more conventional life of marriage and motherhood.

French Braid is the latest of Anne Tyler’s family novels, here focused on the Garrett family, beginning with Robin and Mercy on vacation with their three children in 1959. Although this is only my second time reading a Tyler novel, I know from listening to others that Tyler hones in on family relationships in all of her books. Perhaps the major difference here is in how family members over the generations up to the present fail to relate. This failure was only a part of why I had difficulty with the book.

My emotions did not become fully engaged until the final quarter of the book. Then I did feel the deep emotions of several characters. There’s a lack of happiness that accompanies these people, at least in most of the parts of their lives we are privy to. This made it difficult for me to engage with the Garretts. The family members have little insight into themselves or each other so there is no growth. While the writing itself is good, I just can’t recommend this story.

I plan to read more of Tyler’s backlog of books and did enjoy A Spool of Blue Thread.

A copy of this book was provided by the publisher through NetGalley in return for an honest review

Anne Tyler visits the essence of the American family once again. She keenly observes and presents her readers with a history of a Baltimore family through the twentieth century, showing us all the cracks and strengths, feelings real or imagined. We are all woven together, as the title explains.

7/10

Anne Tyler is a wonderful writer. She’s a Pulitzer
Prize winner for goodness sakes. Needless to say, this is a very well written and meticulously crafted book.

Like a French braid, it is a story that weaves through the threads of family dynamic - each strand separate but intertwined with the whole

The Garrett’s went on their first and last family vacation in 1959. The story begins there, at the lake house. Robin and Mercy, the very definition of opposites attract, and their three children: Alice, Lily and David.

Through that vacation we learn about the commonalities and differences of each. Everybody’s unique personality that both separates and binds them together.

The rest of the book follows the families through 7 decades as they grow together in some ways and apart in others. Like a French braid.

This is a wonderful book for anybody who appreciates literature. It’s an engaging story and one I couldn’t put down. I am betting it will be a NYT bestseller and deservedly so.

Well done Anne. Thank you for another classic.

#netgalley #frenchbraid

This is my first novel by Anne Tyler, and I found it underwhelming. I really liked the first 40% of this novel but the tone/story took a different direction, and just became bored after that. I really didn't like Mercy. I just hated everything about her. She was such a cowardly person. Too afraid to ask her husband for a divorce, and too scared to stand up to her snotty/flaky daughter, Lily. And don't even get me started about how she treated that poor cat. Ugh. Anne Tyler seems like she is a talented writer. But she's written a lot of novels, and I guess this wasn't a good novel to start with. Honestly nothing really happens in "French Braid". There's too many characters and not enough substance. The only character I cared about David, but mostly when he was a child, rather than an adult.

Thank you, Netgalley and Knopf for the digital ARC.

I have always loved Anne Tyler books, because they are stories of ordinary people, but they are so much more than that. Such is the case with French Braid, a multigenerational tale of the Garrett family. Their lives are marked with the same events as those of other families — birth, death, marriage, growing old — but Tyler gives their story a spark that makes it become something more than a series of everyday occurrences. I loved reading about the Garretts, and I will always be excited to read another Anne Tyler novel.

Thanks to NetGalley and the publisher for the ARC.

I am a big Anne Tyler fan and was excited to see she had a new book out. The story started out intriguingly--a couple become empty nesters as their youngest goes off to college. Mercy begins to move herself out of her home into her art studio little by little, hoping her husband and children don't notice. Then the book meanders around and seems to lose focus. I was never able to get attached to any of the characters and I came away wondering what was the point of the book and who the main character was. There was really no one to root for and nothing ever really happened. It was just random bits from a life of a family. While there were parts I enjoyed, when I finished the book I felt dissatisfied.

This novel brilliantly captures the complicated dynamics of family relationships. Tender scenes shift to moments of callous disregard, and the crazy patterns of behavior that mark most--if not all--families are infused with humor and insight. An engaging read!

Absolutely love Anne Tyler. Characters are always so lifelike. Could have spent another 300 pages living in the world of these characters.

Tyler’s multi-generational novel is a microscopic look into the life of a family. The book is made of quiet moments and small interactions, all the things that add up to make a family. The characters are expertly drawn and I felt I knew them each intimately (despite there being 3 people named Robin!). The plot is meandering but meaningful as Tyler moves through time to show the ripple effects of events across generations. The novel is melancholy, joyful and ordinary, just like most families.

French Braid by Anne Tyler
I really liked this book, but thought it was a bit all over the place.
The POV shifts frequently, and you stay in one person's story for a long time, then get jumped over years or to a different story.

I thought it was good in how it showed that families can come from different places and be made in different ways.
The connection to the title was a LONG time coming, only discussed at the very end of the book.
So as I was reading that was kind of a nagging little thought- why is this the title.
The author did a great job of fleshing out the characters and creating people who sounded very real.
I enjoyed the book, (after a slow start) and I'm sure anyone who has read Anne Tyler would enjoy it as well.

Thank you to NetGalley and Alfred A. Knopf for an ARC of this book in exchange for my honest opinion.

To follow the rug metaphor on the lovely cover of this book, Anne Tyler excels at quietly unraveling the threads that bind families together–and finding the small tears that leave rips in the binding for decades. The Garrett family is somewhat unremarkable; Alice, Lily, and David are the children with little in common. Mercy is their distracted, artistic mother, and her husband, Robin, is blissfully unaware of most of the family’s deeply held desires.

From an early family vacation in the 1950s through the start of COVID, French Braid examines how families know–and don’t know–one another, and how they manage to create lives together and separately. There’s little action here, but it’s a good choice for a character-driven novel that’s a fast and easy read.

Does anyone else write realistic human relationships like Anne Tyler? I don't think so. These characters are real people in my mind, so expertly they are drawn. I liked them and also didn't like them, and they felt fully like my neighbors and friends- you learn to take the good with the bad, the negative with the positive, as you see their humanity and allow them to see yours.

This read like a collection of shorts stories about a single family. I enjoyed parts of it and appreciated the way the characters mirrored a typical family with all of its complications and flaws. Overall, I enjoyed it, but I didn't really care for any of the characters except David, so I had a hard time identifying with them. The story about David's family and the pandemic was my favorite and really captured the little intricacies of that crazy time period.

I love the cover of this book so much. It totally drew me in and made me request it. Sadly, the old adage is true: you can't judge a book by it's cover. This is a very quick read and I almost DNFed it because the first chapter was just so odd. It takes place in 2010, but it read like the 1950s (other than the mention of a cell phone.) The language was so dated. I decided to push on since it was such a short book and it did improve, but mostly because a lot of the book took place in the past and the language matched up. There really is no point to this book. There isn't a plot. Each chapter focuses on a different member of this very disconnected family over the years. It reads more like a collections of short stories rather than a novel. It was a pretty depressing read that left me with a jaded view of people and families that I was eager to move on from and shake off.

French Braid
Anne Tyler
Fiction
Nancy
5

At seventeen Alice is the oldest of the Garrett children (ahead of Lily, fifteen, and David, seven) when her family take their first (and only) vacation, in spite of the fact that the only one to embrace the idea is their mother, Mercy. The teenagers are past the age of looking forward to time with their parents, David is afraid of being forced to learn to swim, and dad Robin has never understood what to do with himself if he isn’t running the hardware store. Regardless, the five of them spend an interminable week in 1959 at Deep Creek Lake where each of them acts exactly as they do at home in Baltimore: Alice takes on the responsibility for the practical work of managing things, Lily finds a boy to crush on, and David entertains himself with his toys and his singing (avoiding the water at all costs), while Robin keeps himself busy with little chores around the cabin and Mercy disappears with her paints and sketchpad. Really, they behave on vacation exactly as they do at home: this is not a family that has mastered spontaneity, or one that fosters interaction with one another.

In short, the Garretts are a normal family, with perfectly normal lives. It takes Anne Tyler to make them real and to not only create them and write about them, but to do it so well that we want to read about the decades of their lives. This may be Tyler’s best novel since Dinner at the Homesick Restaurant!