Amanda Eyre Ward

"When seventy-year-old Charlotte Perkins submits a sexy essay to the "Become a Jetsetter" contest, she dreams of reuniting her estranged children: Lee, an almost-famous actress; Cord, a handsome Manhattan venture capitalist who can't seem to find a bride; and Regan, a harried mother who took it all wrong when Charlotte bought her a Weight Watchers gift certificate for her birthday. Charlotte yearns for the years when her children were young and she was a single mother who meant everything to them. When she wins the cruise, the family packs all their baggage--literal and figurative--and spends ten days traveling from sun-drenched Athens through glorious Rome to tapas-laden Barcelona on an over-the-top cruise ship, the Splendido Marveloso. As lovers new and old join the adventure, long-buried secrets are revealed, and the Perkins family is forced to confront the defining choices in their lives. Can four lost adults find the peace they've been seeking by reconciling their childhood aches and coming back to each other? In the vein of The Nest and The Vacationers, Ward has created a delicious and intelligent novel about the courage it takes to reveal our true selves, the pleasures and perils of family, and how we navigate the seas of adulthood to cruise--we can only hope--toward joy"--

A Novel

The Jetsetters

Cheri McElroy

The premise of this book was great: a mother of three grown children wins a cruise. They all go together and the dysfunction of each person, caused by a tragic past event, come to the surface.

Yes, there was drama, a bit of humor, and some healing, However, the characters seemed one-dimensional and, frankly, the mother especially was completely self-consumed and annoying. And the ending was super-abrupt. 2.5⭐️ rounded up.

Shan

The Jetsetters looked like a fun and exciting beach read and while it was quite a read, it is more of a cozy and sometimes tearful read. The Jetsetters went much deeper than I anticipated as each member of the family searches to be loved in one way or another. However, as one who loves family drama, this is a great read. There are multiple trigger warnings in this one, so I recommend looking them up if you are interested in them. Not a light read, but a good read.

Lulu

If I had enjoyed the writing, this would've been a neutral three star read for me, but since that was not the case I've had to settle for two. Not a bad plot, necessarily, but it just didn't grip me, nor did I find it in any way relatable.

NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER * Reese's Book Club x Hello Sunshine Book Pick * Named One of the Best Beach Reads of 2020 by Parade, O: The Oprah Magazine, and Good Housekeeping "The exuberant activity aboard the Splendido Marveloso is no match for the fireworks set off as the lies explode. Full of wicked humor and delicious destination details."--People (Book of the Week) When seventy-year-old Charlotte Perkins submits a sexy essay to the Become a Jetsetter contest, she dreams of reuniting her estranged children: Lee, an almost-famous actress; Cord, a handsome Manhattan venture capitalist who can't seem to find a partner; and Regan, a harried mother who took it all wrong when Charlotte bought her a Weight Watchers gift certificate for her birthday. Charlotte yearns for the years when her children were young, when she was a single mother who meant everything to them. When she wins the contest, the family packs their baggage--both literal and figurative--and spends ten days traveling from sun-drenched Athens through glorious Rome to tapas-laden Barcelona on an over-the-top cruise ship, the Splendido Marveloso. As lovers new and old join the adventure, long-buried secrets are revealed and old wounds are reopened, forcing the Perkins family to confront the forces that drove them apart and the defining choices of their lives. Can four lost adults find the peace they've been seeking by reconciling their childhood aches and coming back together? In the vein of The Nest and The Vacationers, The Jetsetters is a delicious and intelligent novel about the courage it takes to reveal our true selves, the pleasures and perils of family, and how we navigate the seas of adulthood.

Eliza adkins 

Not going to lie I expected a lot more from this. It took almost half of the book for the story line to finally start, the characters were just not it for me, and I literally had to make myself finish the book just so I could move onto a new one.

Maggie Hepditch

This book is straight up terrible. I expected to get a fun little Modern Family type book and instead got a depressing soap opera. Charlotte is criminally horny and it's kind of disgusting. There's no resolution for any of the characters. The ending felt very rushed. The writing was just not good. What was even the point of the epilogue? Also, major trigger warning for suicide.

Bethany Williamson

This book was great! It was a perfect book to listen to while i was working or doing things around the house. There’s family drama but also family love and It’s a quick and easy read or listen! It would also be a perfect beach read!

Dawn Ellis

Wanted it to be so much better. Powered through to finish it. 

Chelsea White

3.5 stars. The family in focus was chaotic, utterly selfish, and so real. Everyone was so wrapped up in their own lives and internal drama, that they had trouble recognizing that same struggle in their mom (or children) and siblings. I recognized myself in each of these characters in different ways, and rather than putting me off the book, it made me more interested in each of the characters. I wanted to know more about Regan though, she was the one character I didn’t feel got her fair share of internal narrative in a way that let us know who SHE was as deeply as her siblings.
Overall a good book!

Jan Talkington

Vanessa Bintou

Well, I had no idea what I was getting into, since for some reason I hadn't read the synopsis, but I thought It would be a funny or sweet contemporary book, possibly because of the beautiful cover. Instead, I read a nice story about complicated family dynamics. It's a story about a widower that goes on a cruise, that she won in a writing competition, with her three grown up children.
I have to say that the family is very dysfunctional, everyone has struggles and keeps secrets and I felt like everything could have been explored deeper... I didn't fall in love with the book, mainly because I didn't really liked the setting and the ending didn't satisfy me, but in general it was good.

ARC provided by the publisher via NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.

The Jetsetters A Novel

Reviews