A story of deprivation, exploitation, and death set in MEXICO and SPAIN
Family mystery saga set in Sydney
30th September 2021
Apples Never Fall by Liane Moriarty, family mystery saga set in Sydney.
Apples Never Fall Far From the Tree….
Reading a novel with tennis at much of its heart has been interesting over the last couple of weeks as I have been glued to the TV watching the meteoric rise of 18 year old Emma Raducanu at the U.S. Open. It’s set in Sydney, location isn’t particularly strong.
Central to the novel is the Delaney family. The parents over their lifetime have run a tennis academy and they had one notable success among their juniors but his involvement came to an abrupt end. The parents’ focus on this emerging talent led to all kinds of responses from the children, none of whom had the ultimate talent to really be groomed for top success. The children now are all grown up and living their own lives.
Mum Joy, one day, goes missing. It seems she and husband Stan had an argument. In recent times they had experienced an odd and random encounter with a young woman called Savannah, who bowled up to their door in a state of great distress, having suffered abuse at the hands of her partner. Joy, with some world wariness (she hides away the more obvious valuable items), welcomes her into their home and offers her her daughter Amy’s room. And there she is, like a cuckoo in the nest. The children are of course pretty taken aback by how Savannah has wheedled her way into their parents’ home. Thereafter Joy disappears.
The driver of the novel, of course, is the desire to learn what happened to Joy and perhaps find out a little more about Savannah and how it was possible for her to inveigle herself into their lives.
The author is gifted at observations and relationship dynamics, the throw-away lines that might mean so much more between siblings, the resentments and frustrations all swirling between the different personalities. There is humour, too and wonderful little tidbits of soundbites and observations, that is her stellar skill. The story, though, felt overly long and drawn out, I found myself – generally – caring little for the characters and for me it was really missing a thumping ‘wow’ factor to hook me in. I also found myself often distracted, wondering which character Nicole Kidman would play in the TV adaptation!
Sydney isn’t a particularly strong setting.
Tina for the TripFiction Team
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I used to be a tennis viewing fanatic back in the day. However hubbie isn’t a big sports fan, so I generally don’t get to watch much these days, unless it is a big game and there is a Brit involved. We did sit glued to Emma’s finals win, so that’s the most important thing!
I haven’t read anything by this author and to be honest, books set in Australia don’t cross my desk too often, although I should make more of an effort to track some down, so I shall start by adding this one to my ‘wish list’!
Sometimes it is difficult to know whether to add a book to TF or not, as the locations are not always well described or developed in an otherwise good story. I get a bit frustrated when an author blends real locations with fictional place names, as that’s another ‘grey area’.
Nice post – thanks for sharing! 🙂