Because I read this book a month ago, and the plot is somewhat convoluted, I am resorting to the plot summary from Goodreads to help me explain what the book is about:
Bernadette Fox is notorious. To her Microsoft-guru husband, she’s a fiercely opinionated partner; to fellow private-school mothers in Seattle, she’s a disgrace, to design mavens, she’s a revolutionary architect, and to 15-year-old Bee, she’s a best friend, and simply, Mom.
Then Bernadette disappears. It began when Bee aced her report card and claimed her promised reward: a family trip to Antarctica. But Bernadette’s intensifying allergy to Seattle – and people in general – has made her so agoraphobic that a virtual assistant in India now runs her most basic errands. A trip to the end of the earth is problematic.
To find her mother, Bee compiles email messages, official documents, secret correspondence – creating a compulsively readable and touching novel about misplaced genius and a mother and daughter’s role in an absurd world.
I know I’m ridiculously late to the party when it comes to this book. So far this year, it’s already been reviewed by Badkittyuno and MelBivDevoe, and last year, for Cannonball V, it was reviewed by a staggering 15 people (search the archives to find the reviews). So a lot of my fellow Cannonballers already know how great this book is. I’m not even going to pretend that I’ve read all your reviews, sorry guys, but way to go for discovering this book before me.
Maria Semple was one of the staff writers on Arrested Development, so it should be no surprise that she can do funny, satirical and absurd. Even having noticed that a lot of people out there were excited about this book, I really had no idea what to expect. The book was quite different from what I thought going in. Full review here.
