The Vacationers
By Emma Straub
(Riverhead Hardcover, 9781594631573, May 2014, 304pp.)
The Short of It:
Vacations have the ability to restore within you, what’s been missing all along.
The Rest of It:
The Post family heads to the island of Mallorca for two weeks of much-needed bliss. Franny and Jim have been married for 35 years but after his recent indiscretion with a young woman in his office, Franny is convinced that the marriage is over but goes along with the vacation for the sake of her daughter Sylvia, who is heading to college in the fall and her son Bobby, who is meeting them there and bringing along his much older girlfriend whom no one likes. Along for the ride is Franny’s good friend Charles and his husband Lawrence, both of which are waiting anxiously for word on the adoption they applied for before arriving at the house. Toss in a sexy tutor for Sylvia and this rag-tag group of vacationers is complete.
I can’t say that I really enjoyed any of the characters in this novel, but the interactions between them felt very real to me. Tension runs high as Franny and Jim’s secret comes out. But what impressed me the most is how accurately this family is portrayed. It’s a vacation, on a beautiful island but all is not pretty and that’s typically how it is when you gather a bunch of strong personalities and put them under one roof. There’s bickering and a lot of politics when it comes to sharing meals and beds. Set against the backdrop of a beautiful island it all seems gritty and unpleasant but at the same time, impossible to ignore.
It’s not a page turner, in that you’ll find yourself anxiously flipping pages to see how it all turns out, but it’s an interesting read nonetheless. Given the setting and title, I can see a lot of beach goers adding this one to their summer bag but it’s definitely for readers who enjoy a little dysfunction in their summer reading. I could smell the tanning oil while reading it but I also kind of needed a drink right after. It’s that kind of book.
Source: Sent to me by the publisher via Edelweiss.
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