When I flipped through the Perth Writers
Festival brochure I was shocked and excited to see one of my favourite author’s
names. Liane Moriarty, in PERTH?!?! my
mind exclaimed. I was in a year-long reading slump and decided I’d had enough.
A few of Liane’s pre-Husband’s Secret novels were sitting unread on my
bookshelf so I picked up the one I knew the least about (I had started reading
Three Wishes a while back but I wanted to dive into something completely
afresh). That book happened to be The Last Anniversary.
It all happened because of a mystery. The Munro
Baby Mystery, to be specific. A baby was found in its home, the parents nowhere
to be found. Alice and Jack Munro disappeared into thin air, leaving the kettle
boiling for tea and a freshly baked marble cake ready for frosting. The
neighbours, two teenage girls, Connie and Rose, came by to visit them and found
the baby.
This mystery is the basis of every plotline and
character in the novel. Connie and Rose took the baby home and looked after her
as their own. They called the baby Enigma, and Enigma went and had kids, and
then her two kids went and had three kids. All the kids are adults now, the
youngest is in their late thirties. Suffice to say, there are a lot of
characters in this book. It took me a little while to figure out who was whose
daughter, who were siblings, who were cousins, etc. But obviously it was worth
it to take the time to get to know the characters, because it’s Liane Moriarty
and duh, the book is gonna be awesome. And it was. Awesome characters, awesome
writing, awesome storyIine, awesome everything. I rated it 4.5 stars, so..
When I found out what really happened to Alice
and Jack Munro, the novel that Moriarty wove with the stories and histories of
the characters – none of that really lost its magic or beauty because the
people were the same. The characters were written so beautifully and
endearingly (even Ron! Oh my gosh) you can’t help but be charmed to your bones
and love the lot of them. The characters were really the substance, and because
they were placed in such a wonderfully thought out story and were delivered
with such adorable, funny and clever writing, everything lifted each other and
it made for a wonderful read.
My favourite character is easily Sophie, the
only non-relation to the family, but the one I related to the most. Liane Moriarty doesn’t write plain old chick
lit. What even is chick lit? A rom-com in the form of literature? A book most
women will love? I don’t know. I put The Last Anniversary in this category
because I see chick lit more as the latter. Someone might delve into the novel
and see it as Sophie’s journey to finding her husband. But that’s only one
thread of narrative in a much more gigantic picture. The Last Anniversary is
not a light floaty read. It’s not a romantic comedy fluff piece. Moriarty
writes each of the characters’ POVs, but in third person. Grace has post-natal
depression. Thomas is in an unhappy marriage and is in love with someone else.
Margie has self-esteem and body issues. Rose is in chronic pain. Connie is
dead. Oh, I forgot to mention that didn’t I? Haha. Well, you find out about
that little nugget within the first few pages anyway.
If you think you’d like a story like the one
I’ve been describing, I think you’ll love this book. It’s hilarious and enchanting,
but at the heart of it, real people and real issues are dealt with in a
wonderful way.
No comments:
Post a Comment