Yet another good NUBClub book spoiled by the ending. The group split on this book, but the take on the book was largely the same; it was really more of a question of whether you thought the stronger parts outweighed the one very weak one or vice versa. On the plus side, Clegg presents a very compelling and very believable family in grief, blame, and self-recrimination. At the heart of it is the unusual love story between June and Luke, a couple of different ages and backgrounds, that ends tragically when Luke and several of June's family members die in a fire in June's house. The distance and pain the survivors suffer, and the fascination that peripheral characters have with their grief, is very powerful. Not much happens in the early part of the book, but the weight of the fire is palpable and it's hard to stop reading the emotional wreckage, particularly that June and Luke's mother Lydia feel. That strained dynamic, coupled with the unfolding revelation of causes and context of the moment of the fire, are masterfully handled. But then the book winds towards an ending, and it suddenly veers into ridiculous coincidence. We understood that the story has to tie up somehow, but really all the key grieving characters just end up in the same bed and breakfast? The whole final act is just so contrived that it sucked the life out of the conclusion and kicked some of us out of the story altogether. No one defended this -- it's a bad ending. If you liked the book, it's because the family dynamics and structure of the tragedy allowed you to ignore the ham-fisted end. It's a good book with a fatal flaw, and if you think you can forgive a cheesy and untrue plot twist, the rest of Did You Ever Have a Family is worth a read.
