The Hoffman Affairs by Beth Schorr Jaffe followed the lives of Monika & Henri Hoffman from their meeting in Paris, through their move to New York City. I really enjoyed that the novel followed these character from their young lives in 1942 through to 1995. What I felt was missing from this story, was getting to really know and care about the family and friends that they meet in New York. The only character that was totally fleshed out was Manny Hoffman, Henri's relative who helped them come to New York City. All the other characters were not fleshed out enough for me to really care about them whatsoever. Other than the characterization, I found the book to be a fairly enjoyable read.

The DRAMA of this book! I have a little bit of a love/hate relationship with it, I think. This is a family drama and the reader is thrown right into the middle of it. There are so many affairs, betrayals, secrets, it's almost hard to keep up. This was not my favorite book, but it's well-written and if you're a fan of a big, messy family saga, it's for you.

The Hoffman Affairs is a multi-POV novel that follows a historical recounting of a young Parisian boy and German girl as they grow older and expand their families. It felt like I was reading a historical recounting of the most disturbing familial issues and relationships. Trauma from war-times continue to plague the characters as they try their best to move forward and heal their multi-generational wounds. The author was able to capture the voice of the times well.

I found this book to be far too slow for my taste and I could not find a connection with the characters. I am hoping to read other books by this author and have different opinions.

I’m trying to decide if I have a love/hate relationship with this book or I really don’t think it’s for me. There’s so much going on with it that at times I wanted to throw it across the room! But other times I couldn’t put it down. It is about the Hoffman family and their many, varied affairs. The good, the bad and the ugly. At times I felt like the author must have been sitting in a conference room with several people and said okay, this couple can only have one child, what’s the next worst thing that we can make happen to the family…and on and on. The characters are fairly well developed. I could know some of the members of the family but I don’t really want to. The others are too busy trying to keep family secrets in the family that they don’t have the time to get to know outsiders. Different type of book but I did finish it so that’s surely worth something. Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for allowing me to read an advance copy for my honest review.

Dang…talk about being thrown into the middle of one family’s drama filled lives!!

Throughout this whole book we are immersed in the lives of the four main characters and viewing everything that happens between them from each of their perspectives.

I’ve been trying to decide how I feel about this book pretty much the whole time, but I think mostly because the author did a great job at making me feel strongly about each character…but especially about one in particular. The one you really grow to hate because of how awful of a person they are. You hate how they are so manipulative, conniving, deceitful, narcissistic, delusional, etc. and you spend the whole book “yelling” at them. Overall, I never really got super into the story, I just felt bad for everyone and everything they had to endure due to the war.

I will say I always appreciate being able to delve into the minds of people that have suffered through a war and even though this was mostly a fictional story, it was fascinating understanding each character and how the war molded who they became.

Thank you to the author as well for sharing how her father’s stories and life contributed to what would later become this book.