Recommended by: Books and Cooks, who reads good books and has pictures of pretty food that makes me feel envious. I finished this today, and then I went ahead and read Waiting for Daisy, and I had such a strong reaction to Waiting for Daisy that I’m having a hard time remembering what I thought of Matrimony.
This is one of those that doesn’t have a catchy plot. It starts with the main character, Julian, and he meets a friend called Carter in his freshman year writing seminar. Julian meets a girl called Mia and Carter meets a girl called Pilar (I really have a hard time believing that’s a name), and then it’s about what happens with them. Mainly Julian and Mia. Lots of cancer and fertility issues and marriage problems – so actually, not entirely unlike Waiting for Daisy.
I thought this book was spotty. In bits I was greatly enjoying it – the first segment, for instance, when Carter and Julian are in writing class together, I thought was excellent – and in bits I was just plodding along wanting to get to the end. Sometimes everyone got way much omphaloskeptic. Sometimes I was quite invested in what was going to happen. Sometimes just not at all.
In sum: better, actually, than I expected, but I won’t ever find it necessary to read this again.