Name: The People We Keep
ISBN: 9781638081135

Allison Larkin

Little River, New York, 1994: April Sawicki is living in a motorless motorhome that her father won in a poker game. Failing out of school, picking up shifts at Margo's diner, she's left fending for herself in a town where she's never quite felt at home. When she "borrows" her neighbor's car to perform at an open mic night, she realizes her life could be much bigger than where she came from. After a fight with her dad, April packs her stuff and leaves for good, setting off on a journey to find a life that's all hers.

The People We Keep

Maria

"Little River, New York, 1994: April Sawicki is living in a run-down motorhome, flunking out of school, and picking up shifts at the local diner. But when April realizes she's finally had enough-enough of her selfish, absent father and barely surviving in an unfeeling town-she decides to make a break for it. Stealing a car and with only her music to keep her company, April hits the road, determined to live life on her own terms. She manages to scrape together a meaningful existence as she travels, encountering people and places she's never dreamed of, and could never imagine deserving. From lifelong friendships to tragic heartbreaks, April chronicles her journey in the beautiful music she creates as she discovers that home is with the people you choose to keep. "Allison Larkin knows her characters so well," (Rainbow Rowell, #1 New York Times bestselling author of Eleanor & Park) and brings her "tender, and real" (Taylor Jenkins Reid, author of Daisy Jones & The Six) prose to this unflinching, lyrical tale that is perfect for anyone who has ever yearned for the fierce power of belonging or to understand the profound beauty of a family found along the way"--

Bit of trauma porn but story of a girl discovering herself and the world despite her self destructive tendencies and what it means to have a found family

Abigail F

Lisa Lindquist 

Kristen Claiborn

When I first started, in earnest, trying to review books, I gave out five stars every other book. A large part of that is because I read books I was interested in reading...whether it was because of the author or the genre...or the description. I also have a HUGE amount of respect for those who write books. Writing books is friggin hard. So when I wrote a review, my heart just wouldn't let me say anything other than I loved it. But that changed when I decided I wanted to make an effort to maybe someday review books for a living. So I picked up books the whole world was reading, books recommended by celebrities, books on bestseller lists, etc. I found it more difficult to love every book. I judge a book based on my own personal connection to it, so now if I absolutely hate a book, I avoid writing a review. I don't want to raze an author because I didn't feel connected to the words, however I have done it a few times. But I have found I give five stars far less often. 
 The truth is this book would have been a 4.5 if I had that option, but since I don't, I rounded up. April is a character that I felt intensely sorry for as soon as I turned the first page. She got dealt a bad hand, and she didn't cope well. Larkin did an excellent job of establishing her story and invoking empathy. I wanted to throttle her father, and I suppose that was Larkin's goal. At many points in this story I also wanted to throttle April. She made so many dumb decisions that I wanted to reach through the story and shake her. It occurs to me, however, that a young woman who was brought up by people who also made bad decisions, she didn't really have a great foundation. Again, Larkin set that up nicely. 
 What I loved about this book is how Larkin was able to weave a tapestry of family that weren't blood related to this girl. April was influenced by so many people throughout her journey, each of them taking a place in her heart and teaching her a valuable lesson. She learns how to accept love, which is something many people struggle with. April had a family that was pulled together not through blood, but through life, and I feel like that's something many people can identify with. And finally, a happy ending. I'm a HUGE fan of happy endings, one that ties it up with a tidy bow. I appreciated that so much with this book.

Sarai Johnson

It’s fine. Not ground breaking, but it’s pretty quick and easy.

Stacey Rainey 

I loved this book. A demonstration of what happens to a person who is not well loved in their early days. It crushes some and creates unexpected resilience in others. April somehow creates a life for herself, gathering members of her chosen family as she moves from place to place, almost afraid of staying anywhere too long.

Cassie Annesi

I really enjoyed this book for the truth it portrayed. How even though, from the outside looking in, we could see the love people had for her, but she was never able to see it for herself. To April, she was never enough. I loved this book because it really is about the people we decide to keep in our lives, family doesn't have to be the one you are born into.

Celeste Richardson

This is one of those times when I’m really thankful for Book of the Month. For some reason, The People We Keep isn’t a book I’ve really heard mentioned anywhere else. If it hadn’t been one of BotM’s options, I might have never heard of it, much less picked it up. I’m so incredibly thankful that I did, though. The People We Keep is a heartbreakingly beautiful story that perfectly balances sorrow and joy. With a diverse cast of larger-than-life characters and a protagonist that I not only rooted for but wished I could pluck from the pages and adopt, this book filled my heart to the bursting point and gave me an even greater appreciation for all of the wonderful people in my own life. 
“We have people we get to keep, who won’t ever let us go. And that’s the most important part. That’s what’s true.”
April is 16 when she plays her first gig and decides to drop out of high school, all within 24 hours. Her mom left when April was just a kid, and her dad is building a new family while trying to forget that his daughter even exists. With only her dad’s ex-girlfriend to miss her, April decides to hit the road. I absolutely adore April. She’s a beautifully developed character, and watching her change and grow over the course of the novel almost felt like watching helplessly as my child grew up, with no way for me to reach her. She suffered some serious hardship, and I think Larkin did a wonderful job balancing resilience and heartache, allowing April to be both jaded and optimistic in the same breath. This dichotomy made her such a believable character, as I think that is how most of us face tough situations, with a mix of cynicism and cautious hope. That blend just feels so honest to real life. There’s plenty of ugliness, but there’s beauty, too, if you look.
“I want to believe there will still be newness in the world for me. That it's not all faded and dusty.”
I was immediately drawn into this story by the first chapter, when April is playing at an open mic night for the first time. Larkin’s descriptions of how April felt about her music, how it felt to sing and be at one with her guitar, how much different it was playing songs she wrote for an audience instead of alone in her dilapidated motorhome, were captivating.  I always love books where music is important, and here it’s almost a character in its own right. If Larkin isn’t a musician herself, she must be close to someone who is. I loved April’s songwriting process and the value she placed on her instrument.
“If someone changes so much that they’re barely the same person, who are you even missing?”
The various settings of this book were all excellent, none moreso than Ithaca. It turns out this is because Larkin attended Ithaca College. Her love for the town shines so brightly in this book. But the other locales featured in the story were also well presented, and felt like important elements of the plot instead of randomly chosen locations in which a story could happen. I kind of hate that a book set in the 1990s is now considered historical fiction, but that’s the price of getting older, I suppose. But the prices and payphones and lack of some newer technology all served the story very well. Setting this book in the 90s was exactly the right choice. I also loved visiting all of the bars and coffeeshops, seeing their similarities contrasting their wild differences. Even April’s car was an important setting, which I thought was a fun writing decision on Larkin’s part.
“I say that it's amazing how much you can miss people you only got to be with for one tiny perfect bit of time; how a place where you barely got to live can be the closest thing you've ever had to home.”
While I loved the settings, and the music, and the plot that tore at my heart, the crowning achievement of this novel is its characters. I’ve already discussed how much I loved April, but the supporting cast was just as wonderful. Everywhere April went, she somehow found people who were odd and diverse and plagued with their own problems, but were at the same time so full of love to give her. Larkin wisely inserted a few characters who didn’t fit this description, which just made the goodness of the other characters blaze even brighter. If I were asked to choose one book to serve as a perfect example of the found family trope, this would be the one I chose. I wish these people were real, and that I could take a roadtrip to meet them all.
“I wonder if maybe all you do is meet people and lose them. And their smile fades the further you go, because you have to carry the space they leave.... And maybe the space gets bigger and heavier every year.”
The People We Keep captured my heart on the first page and kept its grip tight even after I read the final scene. Larkin is a gifted author, and I’m so glad to have come into contact with her work in general and this book in particular. If you love a found family, or music, or a phenomenally developed protagonist and supporting cast, or all of the above, you should definitely read this book.


  (Side note: If you’re an audiobook person, The People We Keep is narrated by the always phenomenal Julia Whelan!)


You can find  this review and more at Novel Notions.

Sehr depri aber spannend und ein schönes Ende

Ann-Kathrin 

Sehr depri aber spannend und ein schönes Ende



kelby

my last binge read before the semester begins and i ended on a 5 star note it was meant to be 

found this book at a bookstore and chose it based on the title and cover alone and i was shocked at how good it was. great story about a drifter finding her chosen family

my only hold up is the large age gap relationship at the beginning of the book - in my head april is at least 20 years old lol

Hannah Sween

OH boy, where do I even begin? This one took me a long time to get through but not because I didn’t like it, because I had to digest it in small pieces. April’s story is heartbreakingly realistic and Larkin’s writing is gorgeous.

Cindy Lieberman

A resourceful young woman runs away from her problems to pursue her dream of music, only to find life on the road as a musician comes with its own set of problems. Well written and a quick listen. I was occasionally frustrated by the main character’s decisions that put her in danger or hurt those who cared for her. This, however, kept the story from being too predictable.

Suz Corso

2.5/5. I wanted to love this book but I was so irritated with how the main character April was written and her lousy decisions that I didn’t find endearing or understandable part of some grand struggle. Her dating an almost 30 y/o as a 16 y/o made me want to put the book down. I don’t get why the author had to include that. This book got better in the end but I wish April had been written better.

Cassidy

So good. Remembering now that sometimes I don’t read books like this bc I’m very prone to crying at them but man are they good. I’m going to start reviewing my not-romance-fun-reads by number of times I cried. 

Notably, the pacing of this book is perfect. The chapters ebb and flow but they are always as long as they need to be to be April. 10/10

“This is a novel of great empathy, about connections and coming of age, built families and self-acceptance. It contains heartbreak and redemption, and a plucky, irresistible protagonist…[A] propulsive, empathetic novel.” —Shelf Awareness Little River, New York, 1994: April Sawicki is living in a motorless motorhome that her father won in a poker game. Failing out of school, picking up shifts at a local diner, she’s left fending for herself in a town where she’s never quite felt at home. When she “borrows” her neighbor’s car to perform at an open mic night, she realizes her life could be much bigger than where she came from. After a fight with her dad, April packs her stuff and leaves for good, setting off on a journey to find a life that’s all hers. Driving without a chosen destination, she stops to rest in Ithaca. Her only plan is to survive, but as she looks for work, she finds a kindred sense of belonging at Cafe Decadence, the local coffee shop. Still, somehow, it doesn’t make sense to her that life could be this easy. The more she falls in love with her friends in Ithaca, the more she can’t shake the feeling that she’ll hurt them the way she’s been hurt. As April moves through the world, meeting people who feel like home, she chronicles her life in the songs she writes and discovers that where she came from doesn’t dictate who she has to be. This lyrical, luminous tale “is both a profound love letter to creative resilience and a reminder that sometimes even tragedy can be a kind of blessing” (Caroline Leavitt, New York Times bestselling author).

Summer Stanley

The beginning was very upsetting, and I was unsatisfied with the ending (not in a good way). BUT, I was engaged and cared for April most of the story. Not my favorite, but I wouldn’t discourage reading it. 

Emma Jacqueline

I'm conflicted. The first part in April's hometown and Ithaca was a slog to get through and I had trouble getting past how uncomfortable the age difference in her first romance made me. Then once April really went on the road, the pages flew by and I found myself really appreciating Larkin's prose. It's definitely cheesy even as it strains for realism, but I think overall I'm glad I finished it.

Sade Pramberger

⭐️ 5

This book was so beautiful. It had moments that were heartbreaking, moments where I couldn’t stop smiling, and I felt like my heart was on a roller coaster with the main character.

I got this book with my Book of the Month subscription and I am SO happy that this was one of the books offered for the month of July 2021. I will be recommending this to EVERYONE.

Cola

Growing up I was always searching for a book like On the Road but that had a female protagonist. Before The People We Keep I thought Dave Eggers had come the closest with his book Heroes of the Frontier. 

The People We Keep completely lived up to all my expectations. Beautifully written, with a protagonist that I cried and rooted for the whole way through. I enjoyed it far more than Kerroac's classic. April is much more relatable to me, who also spent my youth constantly searching for where I really felt at home.

Ashley Dellefave

Absolutely adored this one. A book that proves that the important people are the ones who stick around and never stop loving you no matter what. I loved so many of Larkin’s characters and seeing April’s relationship with each of them. Definitely tugs at your heartstrings but in the best way possible.

The People We Keep

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