A Happier Life by Kristy Woodson Harvey

 

Title: A Happier Life

Author:  Kristy Woodson Harvey

Narrated by:  Cassandra Campbell, Devon Sorvari, Fred Sanders

Publisher: Simon & Schuster Audio

Length: Approximately 12 hours and 16 minutes

Source: Review Copy from Simon & Schuster Audio.  Thank you!

What could you do to have a happier life?  I loved a previous job, but the work hours prevented me from spending time with my family.  To have a happier life, I made a job change.

Keaton Smith loses her job due to personnel complications at work.  Work tip – don’t date your co-workers!  Her mother asks her to travel to Beaufort, North Carolina to clean out her grandmother’s house.  Her grandparents (Rebecca and Townsend) died in a car crash in 1976 and her mom and uncle shut up their house and never came back.  Did they really die in a car crash (their bodies were never found)? Will Keaton discover her place in life?

·       This was the July pick for the Brenda Novak Book Club.  I read it in August.  I enjoyed listening to Brenda Novak’s conversation with author Kristy Woodson Harvey about the book.

·       This novel was a good look into life and how decisions can impact your life and generations that follow you.

 

·       I had a hard time at first with the timeline and the ages of everyone.  The grandparents are my great-grandparents’ age and the main character is thirteen years younger than me.  It was explained later that they were older mothers.

·       It is mostly told from Keaton and Rebecca’s points of view, but some chapters are narrated by Townsend, especially from his journal.

·       The narrators were great, and this was a fun audiobook to listen to.

·       I love the story of a granddaughter discovering the story of her grandmother.

·       I enjoyed Rebecca “Becks” St. James’s chapters about being the perfect hostess, falling in love with Townsend, her troubled relationship with her mother, and becoming a mother.  I thought it was fun for their grandkids to find their journals and discover who they were.

·       The characters and community in Beaufort were excellent.

·       I loved when Keaton’s Mom told her that life is not like a Hallmark movie, and she shouldn’t leave the big city for a man.  I laughed out loud.

·       There was a great mystery in the story of what happened to the grandparents, although I did figure it out early on.

·       What makes a happier life?  Becks thinks she couldn’t have had a happier life and loves everything about her life.  Keaton is trying to figure out how to have a happier life.

·       I LOVED the 1970s-time capsule vintage house.

·       I want to host a Beck St. James perfect party.

·       It was interesting that the story was inspired by the mysterious disappearance of the author’s great aunt and uncle and her experience opening a house that had been closed for fifty years.

 

Overall, A Happier Life was a feel-good story with a great ending.  It was a perfect beach read.