Four of us met at Liz's tonight to discuss Little Children by Tom Perrotta. (My cover had two Pepperidge Farm goldfish on it; everyone else's had two chocolate chip cookies, as does the photo at Amazon. WTF?) Anyhow, we all found it to be a quick, light, enjoyable-enough read, but it just wasn't realistic. The characters weren't fully fleshed out or believable enough.
The first paragraph sent shivers down my spine:
The young mothers were telling each other how tired they were. This was one of their favorite topics, along with the eating, sleeping, and defecating habits of their offspring, the merits of certain local nursery schools, and the difficulty of sticking to an exercise routine. Smiling politely to mask a familiar feeling of desperation, Sarah reminded herself to think like an anthropologist. I'm a researcher studying the behavior of boring suburban women. I am not a boring suburban woman myself.but the Sarah character didn't hold me. She's a stay-home mom who ends up having an affair with a stay-home dad, but not enough of it rang true for me. And there was a curious subplot about a sex offender who lives nearby and is tormented by a local ex-cop.
We were trying to cast this book as a movie and ended up just discussing our favorite movie stars. Johnny! Viggo! Nicole! Gwyneth! There, that's better.
Next up is The Jane Austen Book Club by Karen Joy Fowler.
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