Mrs Everything: a painful story about women and life

Mrs Everything by Jennifer Weiner is the story from two sisters, Josette “Jo” and Elizabeth “Bethie” Kaufman. From the idyllic 1950s through the turbulent 1960s to today, the sisters face choices as women in the society around them. Jo is the tomboy who turns into a wife and mother without much thought if she really wanted to and Bethie is the princess who turns to drugs and a vagabond lifestyle when events in her life throw her for a loop. As time goes on, the sisters learn to embrace who they really are and live their lives as they find that suits them. Through infidelity, divorce, sexual assault, eating disorders and drug use, the sisters struggle to find a purpose or meaning in the event of their lives. After her divorce, Jo reunites with her first love. Bethie finds peace with herself on a farm. It is a book about woman who try to be everything to everyone and finds out that you simply can’t.

I’m not a big fan of Jennifer Weiner. I have read a few of her earlier books so when I had the opportunity to read this book, I thought, why not? From the open pages to the closing chapter, this book was hard to read. It is overwhelming and I’m not just talking about the number of pages. At 460 pages it is a long book, but I’ve read longer books that I sped through, captivated by the story. Mrs Everything is not that book. The story is divided into 7 parts with most of the book dragging along with the events of these sisters’ lives and speeds up as the book is ending as if the author realized she was running out of room. The sex scenes were graphic for me, who is a fan of romance novels, to put the book down and say “yikes.” I’m no prude when it comes to sex and sexuality, but it wasn’t necessary and felt out of place. There are just way too many social issues crammed into the book that it becomes less a story about two sisters navigating the changing social climate and becomes a political tirade. Plus, there were so many historical inaccuracies that a simple Google search would fix. Songs Jo listened to in college that could not have been playing as they were not released yet. Sloppy research with a bogged down plot, I did not enjoy this book. I do not recommend Mrs. Everything.