I enjoyed Rowley’s novel, The Guncle, which came out in 2019. When I was invited to read and review The Celebrants, I jumped at the chance. Unfortunately, it didn’t do a thing for me. Nonetheless, my thanks go to Net Galley and Putnam Books for the review copy. This book is for sale now.

As a child, we once had a bird bludgeon itself to death on our sliding glass door, unable to accept that the invisible barrier was really there. Reading this book made me feel just a bit like that bird. I’d liked Rowley’s last book. Other Rowley fans liked this book. So why…(BAM!)…why…(BAM!)…why could I not get into it?

I think it all boils down to privilege.

Had I read the premise more carefully, I might have avoided this trap. A group of seven college friends, grief-stricken after losing the eighth friend, agree to meet every few years and give each other mock funerals to celebrate the lives that still exist among them.

What rarefied conditions must exist to make such a thing possible? Imagine having the resources to be able to drop everything and fly off to wherever the meeting is held. Air fare. Childcare. Housing. But as I read the abundant dialogue in this thing, such trivialities are seldom mentioned. These are people that for the most part came from money, and they have money now, and they assume they will have as much, if not more, in the future.

Of course, the story is not about money and privilege. It’s about taking stock of their current lives and comparing them to their youthful expectations. There are secrets. There is baggage. And now, in their middle aged years, they are older, wiser, and in many ways, sadder.

Oh honey. They think they’re old now? My ass!  My children are middle aged. Get a fucking grip.

So okay, I am probably not the ideal audience; and yet, I will remind you that I didn’t volunteer for this. I was selected. Someone clearly believed that I am within the target audience.

I initially felt some of this when I began reading The Guncle. The protagonist there was a successful actor with a pile of money; and yet, the challenges he faced, first with the death of his partner, and then with the homophobic relative that tried to keep him from taking the children that had been entrusted to him, won out. The presence of well-written children helped a good deal, and the humor was completely on point. I cannot fail to appreciate an author that can make me laugh out loud.

I didn’t laugh out loud this time.  It’s grim, but it’s wealthy-people grim, not working class grim. If you don’t know the difference, then we all know which one you are.  I rolled my eyes a great deal, but it’s even harder to read when you do that, so I borrowed the audio from Seattle Bibliocommons. It didn’t help a bit, apart from making it possible to take in the book and roll my eyes at the same time.

I see that this title has been nominated for the Goodreads Choice awards, so clearly, a lot of people have loved this book. But I am not one of them.

Recommended to rich people that believe their lives to be harder than they actually are.