I love when I find a book I can share with everyone—my parents, my friends, my book club, fellow book lovers on social media, professional book lovers visiting my office for meetings, every reader on my Christmas gift list.
Until recently, it had been a while since I found one of those books. And I’ve been desperately longing for another high quality, entertaining family drama ever since finishing Cynthia D’Aprix Sweeney’s THE NEST.
So just imagine how thrilled I was to find THE ANTIQUES by Kris D’Agostino—a heartbreaking, nimble, laugh-out-loud funny send-up of modern family life.
THE ANTIQUES chronicles a week in the life of the Westfall family, who reunite after the death of their patriarch just as a massive hurricane tears through town, destroying their family antique store. Amid dealing with the chaos of the storm and the memorial plans, the Westfall siblings are also losing control over their individual lives.
Armie, the youngest, is struggling to grow up and move out of his childhood home. Middle child Charlie is balancing an emotionally challenged child and a demanding husband with her career as a Hollywood publicist. Josef, the oldest and most successful, is struggling to repair his relationship with his daughters while dealing with an addiction to sex and an obsession with money.
An irresistible, insightful, fast-paced drama about the unexpected epiphanies that emerge in times of grief, the messy complexity of life, and the ways in which family shapes our identity, there is something universal about THE ANTIQUES.
Despite being deeply flawed, I love these affectionately rendered characters. They all feel comfortably familiar and I often forget that the Westfalls are fictional and not my next-door neighbors.
Perhaps that’s why I feel like I can give this book to any reader. Or maybe it’s just because this is a really good book with lots of laughs and smart social commentary about the way we live. Either way, I can’t wait to give this book to readers everywhere.
