It's March 2020 and a calamity is unfolding. A group of friends and friends-of-friends gathers in a country house to wait out the pandemic. Over the next six months, new friendships and romances will take hold, while old betrayals will emerge, forcing each character to re-evaluate whom they love and what matters most. The unlikely cast of characters includes a Russian-born novelist; his Russian-born psychiatrist wife; their precocious child obsessed with K-pop; a struggling Indian American writer; a wildly successful Korean American app developer; a global dandy with three passports; a Southern flamethrower of an essayist; and a movie star, the Actor, whose arrival upsets the equilibrium of this chosen family.
Sounds like an action-packed plot right?
Wrong. Well at least for me, it certainly wasn't all it cracked up to be. In fact, with a tedious pace, underdeveloped characters and half-hearted plot, Our Country Friends dragged its heels and proved the very antonym of immersive. It felt long and needlessly drawn out, despite not actually being that long in terms of page numbers.
It is rare that I give poor reviews, especially in contemporary fiction. However, the only reason this book has two stars (in my eyes) is due to its creative core concept - which proved to be its only saving grace. Besides that, the read was mundane, and easily forgettable.
Sounds like an action-packed plot right?
Wrong. Well at least for me, it certainly wasn't all it cracked up to be. In fact, with a tedious pace, underdeveloped characters and half-hearted plot, Our Country Friends dragged its heels and proved the very antonym of immersive. It felt long and needlessly drawn out, despite not actually being that long in terms of page numbers.
It is rare that I give poor reviews, especially in contemporary fiction. However, the only reason this book has two stars (in my eyes) is due to its creative core concept - which proved to be its only saving grace. Besides that, the read was mundane, and easily forgettable.