Wow. This was really good. I didn’t know where the book was going at all, but I had fun just hanging on for the ride. I wonder how do other readers think this book is going to end? I have some thoughts noodling around in my head.
“Just Like Home” follows 30 something year old Vera Crowder. Vera has been gone from her family home for 15 years. Something drove her away. But now that her mother Daphne is dying, Vera is home to take care of what is needed before she passes away. But being back home causes many conflicting emotions in Vera. Foremost is the feelings for her father.
Vera was complicated. So was Daphne. The toxic love between the two seems to spread through the whole book. You only really get to see Daphne as she really is I think in the sections that jump back into the past. I have so many questions about this character. There’s of course Vera’s father, but also a man staying at the house who has connections to Vera’s father. And of course, Vera’s former childhood best friend Brandon. And last, the house.
The book goes back and forth between the present and Vera as she grows up and starts to see/feel the change in her best friend Brandon. I have to add that I was surprised by the many slow reveals that Gailey gives us. I felt of two minds about them. First, holy crap, and then second, hmmm. I liked it. It worked for the story. Gailey’s story is honestly a story of a mother/daughter relationship that was never really good with the man (husband/father) that came between them again and again.
The setting is mostly the house. You get to find out about it’s nooks and crannies. You keep hearing about how Vera’s father built it with his two hands and how parts of it were very cleverly done. But you wonder at times did he do certain things knowing that eventually it would be found out?
I loved the ending. But I don’t think it spells happiness for Vera in the end.
