PopSugar 2020 Reading Challenge Prompt: A book you meant to read in 2019

Other PS 2020 reading prompts this would satisfy: A book about or involving social media, A book with a main character in their 20s


TW: Polygamy, abuse, violence, mention of self harm, mental illness, some vulgar language, loss of child, 



When I was choosing my December 2019 Book of the Month pick, there were so many good options, but ultimately I went with The Wives because the reviews were really phenomenal, and it seemed like such a unique story.


Thursday is happily married to Seth. She's crazy about him. Their relationship is strong, but there's one, well two, things that make their marriage so unique. Seth's a polygamist and has two other wives, referred to as Monday and Tuesday. In their arrangement, Thursday knows nothing at all about the other wives, other than the days of the week Seth spends with each of them. But she begins to feel insecure, and breaking the rules of their relationship, she begins to search for more information about her husband's other wives. And what she finds out is not what she expected. 


I was so excited to read this book, sold on the reviews from other famous authors and Bookstagrammers alike. And there was so much potential. The premise of the story sounds so unique and enthralling. But the plot fell flat and the writing a bit inconsistent.

During the first half of the book, I was pretty interested and wanting more information. But in a lot of ways, I feel that I didn't get the information I was looking for throughout the story. I never truly connected to any of the characters, and felt like there was virtually no character development, and not enough background information for the majority of the characters, making it really difficult to empathize or care about anyone within the entire novel.

There were a lot of twists within the book. I found the first one to be pretty predictable, and while the others were a bit more twisty, they were just so. damn. messy. The entire second part of the book went downhill and really impacted my overall thoughts on the entire novel.






This was my first time reading a Tarryn Fisher novel, though I know she's a fairly veteran author. I really wanted to love The Wives, and I actually shared with my husband after reading it that it was a pretty insane ride of a story, and his response was "Well, why did you only give it 3 stars?" (My Goodreads reviews post to Twitter.) My problem was the execution and the wrap-up. The plot took a very unexpected, yet predictable turn, and that was upsetting. I expected more from the story than some half-assed plot twist. The story could have gone in a completely different direction and been phenomenal, but alas, it didn't. And I was left feeling disappointed.



Goodreads rating: ★★★☆☆