Name: Erin G.'s review of The Nest by Cynthia D'Aprix Sweeney
Item: The Nest
Rating: 4
Author: Erin G.

Cynthia D'Aprix Sweeney

A warm, funny and acutely perceptive debut novel about four adult siblings and the fate of the shared inheritance that has shaped their choices and their lives. Every family has its problems. But even among the most troubled, the Plumb family stands out as spectacularly dysfunctional. Years of simmering tensions finally reach a breaking point on an unseasonably cold afternoon in New York City as Melody, Beatrice, and Jack Plumb gather to confront their charismatic and reckless older brother, Leo, freshly released from rehab. Months earlier, an inebriated Leo got behind the wheel of a car with a nineteen-year-old waitress as his passenger. The ensuing accident has endangered the Plumbs' joint trust fund, “The Nest,” which they are months away from finally receiving. Meant by their deceased father to be a modest mid-life supplement, the Plumb siblings have watched The Nest’s value soar along with the stock market and have been counting on the money to solve a number of self-inflicted problems. Melody, a wife and mother in an upscale suburb, has an unwieldy mortgage and looming college tuition for her twin teenage daughters. Jack, an antiques dealer, has secretly borrowed against the beach cottage he shares with his husband, Walker, to keep his store open. And Bea, a once-promising short-story writer, just can’t seem to finish her overdue novel. Can Leo rescue his siblings and, by extension, the people they love? Or will everyone need to reimagine the futures they’ve envisioned? Brought together as never before, Leo, Melody, Jack, and Beatrice must grapple with old resentments, present-day truths, and the significant emotional and financial toll of the accident, as well as finally acknowledge the choices they have made in their own lives. This is a story about the power of family, the possibilities of friendship, the ways we depend upon one another and the ways we let one another down. In this tender, entertaining, and deftly written debut, Cynthia D'Aprix Sweeney brings a remarkable cast of characters to life to illuminate what money does to relationships, what happens to our ambitions over the course of time, and the fraught yet unbreakable ties we share with those we love.

The Nest

Reiko Fu

Instant New York Times Bestseller “Hilarious and big-hearted, The Nest is a stellar debut.” — People, Book of the Week “Her writing is like really good dark chocolate: sharper and more bittersweet than the cheap stuff, but also too delicious not to finish in one sitting.”— Entertainment Weekly “Humor and delightful irony abound in this lively first novel.”— New York Times Book Review A warm, funny and acutely perceptive debut novel about four adult siblings and the fate of the shared inheritance that has shaped their choices and their lives. Every family has its problems. But even among the most troubled, the Plumb family stands out as spectacularly dysfunctional. Years of simmering tensions finally reach a breaking point on an unseasonably cold afternoon in New York City as Melody, Beatrice, and Jack Plumb gather to confront their charismatic and reckless older brother, Leo, freshly released from rehab. Months earlier, an inebriated Leo got behind the wheel of a car with a nineteen-year-old waitress as his passenger. The ensuing accident has endangered the Plumbs' joint trust fund, “The Nest,” which they are months away from finally receiving. Meant by their deceased father to be a modest mid-life supplement, the Plumb siblings have watched The Nest’s value soar along with the stock market and have been counting on the money to solve a number of self-inflicted problems. Melody, a wife and mother in an upscale suburb, has an unwieldy mortgage and looming college tuition for her twin teenage daughters. Jack, an antiques dealer, has secretly borrowed against the beach cottage he shares with his husband, Walker, to keep his store open. And Bea, a once-promising short-story writer, just can’t seem to finish her overdue novel. Can Leo rescue his siblings and, by extension, the people they love? Or will everyone need to reimagine the futures they’ve envisioned? Brought together as never before, Leo, Melody, Jack, and Beatrice must grapple with old resentments, present-day truths, and the significant emotional and financial toll of the accident, as well as finally acknowledge the choices they have made in their own lives. This is a story about the power of family, the possibilities of friendship, the ways we depend upon one another and the ways we let one another down. In this tender, entertaining, and deftly written debut, Cynthia D'Aprix Sweeney brings a remarkable cast of characters to life to illuminate what money does to relationships, what happens to our ambitions over the course of time, and the fraught yet unbreakable ties we share with those we love.

Erin G.

Listened to audiobook, the narrator did a great job with all the different character's voices.

samantha

Latitude Tamarind

the only good or valid characters in this book are Louisa and Nora

Amy Vicknair

Mary Rose Luksha

Felt like a 5 star book until the ending, wrapped up a little too nice and happy. The shiny ending seemed disconnected from the darker chapters at the beginning.

Skye Sherman

I've been wanting to read this book since it came out, and I was more than ready to like it. Unfortunately, though I enjoyed the setting and the juicy plot twists, the novel as a whole just didn't hit the mark for me. The book was slow and there were large portions of text, even entire chapters, that had little relevance to the work and could (should?) have been left out of the story. I realized I was 3/4 of the way through the book and caught myself thinking, "But wait, what has happened so far? There's a whole lot of resolution that needs to happen in just these last few pages..." There was a tremendous amount of character development--in fact that's what this work is, mostly--and yet I felt like I never really knew the characters. Or what to make of them. Perhaps Sweeney was trying to paint them in a "human" light, showing that we all have good and bad in us and shouldn't be blanketed by an end-all assessment, but her equivocating ultimately resulted in confusing, tepid, dissatisfying characters the reader isn't sure how to handle. There was too much detail in the wrong places and not enough in the right places, and I found the ending to be unsatisfying as well. 
Overall, a book that's unchallenging and relatively pleasant to read, but a story that is ambiguous and forgettable.

Cindy Lieberman

2.5 Breezy writing could not salvage this novel about four unlikeable siblings expecting a large sum of money ("the nest") from their parents upon the occasion of the youngest sibling turning 40. Started out slowly but did pick up a bit with the (ultimately unnecessary) addition of a half-dozen tangential characters. None of the siblings was particularly well rounded, nor did we learn why they (and their mother) were so entirely self absorbed. When to read: before a family reunion or holiday gathering. It may just make your family feel less dysfunctional...or in good company.

DNF
Boring and I didn't care about the characters at all. The story would bring me close to a character and just when I started getting into that character the story would change direction. Too much hook and bait that I lost interest trying to keep up with everything and I never had a chance to get into any of the characters.
Too bad. The premise was good, the writing was not enogh to hold my attention.

Cola

I don't remember the last time I read fiction that I absolutely loved. The Nest was perfect and made me want to seek out more fiction novels like it. The characters were wonderfully written and beautifully flawed and I'm a sucker for anything that takes place in New York and reminds me of home. I highly recommend giving this a read.

A warm, funny and acutely perceptive debut novel about four adult siblings and the fate of the shared inheritance that has shaped their choices and their lives. Every family has its problems. But even among the most troubled, the Plumb family stands out as spectacularly dysfunctional. Years of simmering tensions finally reach a breaking point on an unseasonably cold afternoon in New York City as Melody, Beatrice, and Jack Plumb gather to confront their charismatic and reckless older brother, Leo, freshly released from rehab. Months earlier, an inebriated Leo got behind the wheel of a car with a nineteen-year-old waitress as his passenger. The ensuing accident has endangered the Plumbs' joint trust fund, “The Nest,” which they are months away from finally receiving. Meant by their deceased father to be a modest mid-life supplement, the Plumb siblings have watched The Nest’s value soar along with the stock market and have been counting on the money to solve a number of self-inflicted problems. Melody, a wife and mother in an upscale suburb, has an unwieldy mortgage and looming college tuition for her twin teenage daughters. Jack, an antiques dealer, has secretly borrowed against the beach cottage he shares with his husband, Walker, to keep his store open. And Bea, a once-promising short-story writer, just can’t seem to finish her overdue novel. Can Leo rescue his siblings and, by extension, the people they love? Or will everyone need to reimagine the futures they’ve envisioned? Brought together as never before, Leo, Melody, Jack, and Beatrice must grapple with old resentments, present-day truths, and the significant emotional and financial toll of the accident, as well as finally acknowledge the choices they have made in their own lives. This is a story about the power of family, the possibilities of friendship, the ways we depend upon one another and the ways we let one another down. In this tender, entertaining, and deftly written debut, Sweeney brings a remarkable cast of characters to life to illuminate what money does to relationships, what happens to our ambitions over the course of time, and the fraught yet unbreakable ties we share with those we love.

Elena Enns

I don’t know what I was expecting when I picked up this book. I was wary about the ensemble cast of characters; as often when I read books that go through different points of views it never works and ends up breaking up the novel. It works here though, with a wonderful flow of story telling.
I love the fact that we aren't over learning about the characters, but just enough to make us care about them and hope that they get what they deserve in the end; even if what they deserve and need isn't what they believe. Overall, a wonderful story that brings together different characters with different motivations, and intermingles them so that they all connect in the perfect way.

An instant Globe and Mail bestseller "Hilarious and big-hearted, The Nest is a stellar debut." --People (A Best Book of 2016) "Her writing is like really good dark chocolate: sharper and more bittersweet than the cheap stuff, but also too delicious not to finish in one sitting." --Entertainment Weekly "Humor and delightful irony abound in this lively first novel." --The New York Times Book Review A wickedly smart, funny and deeply felt debut novel about four adult siblings and the fate of their long-depended-upon family inheritance. An instant Globe and Mail bestseller On a wintry afternoon in New York City, Melody, Beatrice and Jack Plumb gather to confront their charismatic and reckless older brother, Leo, who has just been released from rehab. Leo's bad behaviour, culminating in a car crash while under the influence--a nineteen-year-old waitress beside him--has endangered the Plumbs' joint trust fund, or "the Nest," as they've taken to calling it. The four siblings are at very different places in their lives, but all believe that this money will solve a host of self-inflicted problems and their consequences. And until Leo's accident, they'd been mere months away from receiving it. Can Leo get the Plumbs out of this mess, as he's always been able to do for himself before? Or will the Plumb siblings have to do without the money and the future lives they've envisioned? As the siblings grapple with family tensions, old histories and the significant emotional and financial cost of the accident, Sweeney introduces an unforgettable cast of supporting characters: Leo's stalwart ex-girlfriend who now thinks that maybe, just maybe, he is capable of chan≥ the waitress whose life was shattered in the accident and the Iraqi war veteran who falls in love with her; and a retired, grieving firefighter with a very big secret. Tender, funny and deftly written, The Nest explores what money does to relationships, what happens to our ambitions over the course of our lives, and the fraught but unbreakable ties we have with our families.

A Novel

Lisa Parson

Meagan Fowler

This started off pretty slow and I wasn't that interested until the end but it was still a really good book!

b.andherbooks

A dysfunctional family of adult siblings learns their oldest brother's shenanigans has lost them the "nest" inheritance they were banking on for various reasons, some noble, others less so. With a rotating cast of characters, a funny story that ended up being a bit too twee and likable for me.

The audiobook narrator was excellent, and I'll be featuring this title as my library's next Book to Art Club pick. Not sure yet what craft we'll do!

Gordon McLean

Money never buys happiness

I enjoyed this rambling story of a broken family and how they find their way through a dark time in their lives. Richly told, each character was given enough time to grow and breathe, and with so many themes to explore, most of human existence in the everyday world is covers with intelligence and consideration. Wonderfully written.

Reiko Fu &
The Nest by Cynthia D'Aprix Sweeney

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Reiko Fu &The Nest by Cynthia D'Aprix Sweeney

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Join the club

Reiko Fu &
The Nest by Cynthia D'Aprix Sweeney