All We Ever Wanted by Emily Giffin

Title: All We Ever Wanted
Author: Emily Giffin
Pages: 400
Genre: Fiction/ Contemporary
Publisher: Ballantine Books/Penguin Random House Canada
Release Date: June 26, 2018
Buy: Amazon| Chapters Indigo| Kobo
* Received for review by Penguin Random House Canada*

Summary (Goodreads)

In the riveting new novel from the #1 New York Timesbestselling author of First Comes Love and Something Borrowed, three very different people must choose between their family and their values.

Nina Browning is living the good life after marrying into Nashville’s elite. More recently, her husband made a fortune selling his tech business, and their adored son has been accepted to Princeton. Yet sometimes the middle-class small-town girl in Nina wonders if she’s strayed from the person she once was.

Tom Volpe is a single dad working multiple jobs while struggling to raise his headstrong daughter, Lyla. His road has been lonely, long, and hard, but he finally starts to relax after Lyla earns a scholarship to Windsor Academy, Nashville’s most prestigious private school.

Amid so much wealth and privilege, Lyla doesn’t always fit in—and her overprotective father doesn’t help—but in most ways, she’s a typical teenage girl, happy and thriving.

Then, one photograph, snapped in a drunken moment at a party, changes everything. As the image spreads like wildfire, the Windsor community is instantly polarized, buzzing with controversy and assigning blame.

At the heart of the lies and scandal, Tom, Nina, and Lyla are forced together—all questioning their closest relationships, asking themselves who they really are, and searching for the courage to live a life of true meaning.

Review

Emily Giffin is definitely one of my fiction auto-buy authors because you just fall in love with all of her characters and the story. All We Ever Wanted is one of those books that you won't put down. It is definitely different than her past books which are more romantic contemporary, but this one is talking about issues that are happening in today's society/media.

Told in three point of views of Tom, Lyla and Nina we are told about how one photograph can change everything for Lyla. Nina is the mother to Finch, who is one of the kids, who is married to Kirk (very rich) by selling his tech company. Tom is a single father struggling with working two jobs while taking care of Lyla who is going to a prestigious high school on financial aid.

Overall I felt that this book was relevant, and that each voice was different as they question themselves and truths. It's well written and the story will hook you in immediately. The epilogue was everything plus emotional. The story was so complexed and layered its one book that makes you think. All We Ever Wanted is for sure one of my favourites by Emily Giffin and it won't be the last. Thank you Penguin Random House Canada for letting me review this great book!

4/5