When Morgan and Benji surprise their families with a wedding invitation to Maine, they're aware the news of their clandestine relationship will come as a shock. Twelve years have passed since the stunning loss of sixteen-year-old Alice, Benji's sister and Morgan's best friend, and no one is quite the same. But the young couple decide to plunge headlong into matrimony, marking the first time their fractured families will reunite since Alice's funeral.
This could all make for salacious, fun reading, as these are deeply unpleasant people who spend years bickering with each other, but instead the novel is mostly dreary and Green’s prose is weighed down by a curious formality.
Dramatic if undercooked ... The plot... hints at farce, but the tone never finds its footing, as Green keeps things somber and sedate and the intimations of an illicit relationship between two of the characters evaporate on the way to an enigmatic conclusion. Only the most patient readers need apply.
