Read, Run, Ramble

Title: Hello from the Gillespies

Author: Monica McInerney

Genre: Contemporary Fiction

Publisher: Penguin Group Berkley, NAL/Signet Romance, DAW

Publication Date: November 4, 2014

Format: egalley via Netgalley

Synopsis

My rating: 4 of 5 stars

My review (published at Read, Run, Ramble):

Thank you Penguin Group Berkley, NAL/Signet Romance, DAW via Netgalley for providing me with an early copy of this book!

I had read less than 100 pages when I sat down with Hello from the Gillespies for the second time and I sped through it that day – 500+ pages in less than a day! The pages just had to be turned.

Angela Gillespie’s family is less than perfect, and when the ugly details of all that less than perfectness accidentally gets shared with 200+ people, things get tricky around their outback station!

The characters are cutely quirky, yet with problems that I’m sure most readers can understand or even relate to somewhat. At the heart of things, Angela’s marriage to Nick is on serious shaky ground and until the stuff hits the fan neither has shared the appropriate details with the other.

I laughed out loud while reading this one too. McInerney has written a very sweet book with serious topics and major tension, but it is completely balanced with humor and extremely well-written characters. Just wait until you meet Horrible Jane – HA! As for humor, there’s Ig and Ig is magnificent. He’s such a fun, genuine, and relatively blunt 11-year-old. He had me grinning almost every time he was up in a scene. Not to mention I love his name.

Now let’s talk about setting. This is the only book I’ve ever read set in the Australian Outback (at least that I can remember) and I loved it. McInerney brings it all to life and readers might find themselves feeling the Australian heat no matter where they are currently located. I loved the descriptions of the Gillespie’s station and the surrounding area – I felt like I was getting a mini lesson on Australia with my recreational reading.

My final verdict is this: if you want to settle in with a book that will suck you in, entertain you, and force you to turn pages, pick up Hello from the Gillespies. Seriously, I had NO IDEA I’d read 600+ pages until I checked the page count after completing the book (thank goodness – that page count would have seemed daunting before starting)!

I was provided with an ARC of this book by the publisher in exchange for an honest review. All thoughts and opinions are my own. I am not compensated for any of my reviews.