Julie's Review: The Floating Feldmans

Author: Elyssa Friedland
Series: None
Publication Date: July 23, 2019
Publisher: Berkely
Pages: 366
Obtained: library
Genre:  Contemporary Fiction
Rating: 3/5
Bottom Line: I wanted to laugh more than I did
Grab, Just get it at the library, or Remove from your TBR list? Library

Summary: Sink or swim. Or at least that's what Annette Feldman tells herself when she books a cruise for her entire family. It's been over a decade since the Feldman clan has spent more than twenty-four hours under the same roof, but Annette is determined to celebrate her seventieth birthday the right way. Just this once, they are going to behave like an actual family. Too bad her kids didn't get the memo. 
Between the troublesome family secrets, old sibling rivalries, and her two teenage grandkids, Annette's birthday vacation is looking more and more like the perfect storm. Adrift together on the open seas, the Feldmans will each face the truths they've been ignoring—and learn that the people they once thought most likely to sink them are actually the ones who help them stay afloat. ~amazon.com 

Review: Sometimes I fall into the trap of reading a book that has a lot of buzz but then falls short because of that buzz. In the case of The Floating Feldmans I had trusted people tell me it was funny and I should definitely read it. So when it came in at the library I dropped all other books to read it. Now let me say, that I did enjoy the book but for me it wasn't funny. I'm not even sure if I chuckled. 😑 What I did like was the character development throughout the novel and the realization that as a parent sometimes you have to let them find their own way.

The Feldman's are splilntered across the US with the adult children being in California and Colorado while the parents are still in their family home with very little visiting between all of them. In fact, they struggle to remember when they were all in the same room together. They have all gone their own way with varying degrees of contact. They are definitely not intimately involved in each others lives.  They all do jump at the chance to go on a cruise for their matriarch, Annette's, 70th birthday.  What they don't realize is all the secrets they are keeping will come to surface pretty rapidly as they are all together.

How hard is it for parents to forget who their adult kid was when they were younger and accept that maybe they aren't that person any more. Or the one that you pinned all your hopes and dreams on, doesn't really have it together. The one you dismissed as a screw up found their own path and created a place for themselves and didn't share with you becasue they were worried you wouldn't accept them.

Families are never easy but being in a confined area with a lot of together time typically highlights the issues or secrets you are trying to hide. This was definitely the case with the Feldmans. I liked how each character had their own storyline that meshed with the main plot and how in the end it wasn't tied up with a bow but they all do finally have respect and maybe more love for each other.



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