The Language of Sycamores, Lisa Wingate

After reading Lisa Wingate's, Before We Were Yours and loving every word of it, I highly anticipated my read of The Language of Sycamores; unfortunately, it fell flat for me.

I say this a lot in my reviews, "there is nothing wrong with the book." It is beautifully written, using wonderfully visual, flowery words and phrasing, the characters are believable, likable, and endearing, and the story is good - and that's where it fell apart for me; the story was too good. Maybe it's just me, perhaps the older I get, the more cynical I become, or maybe, just maybe, my life is a unicorn, and all the pieces don't fall into a lovely, complete picture at the end of the day and I can't relate to such stories.

The Language of Sycamores is a story of two sisters, one who partly chose and partly did not choose a career over family, the other who chose family. Through life circumstances (one sister loses her job and has a second cancer scare), the girls come back together, join up to help care for a neighbor girl who lives in what we can guess is a bad situation, and reunite their long-lost distant family. The jobless sister becomes involved in a summer children's program and gains a job with the organization. She doesn't have cancer, the neighbor girl presumably has a good rest of her life with the two sisters and their families, and everyone lives happily ever after. Throw in a preachy undercurrent that doesn't entirely develop until the last few pages, and all boxes get checked.

Again, a nice story, nothing wrong with it, just so unrealistic to my understanding of the world it was difficult for me to lose myself in its pages. Perhaps I'm just jealous.

I would, however, recommend this book - it is a very well-written and crafted novel, and for the right reader, one not quite as seemingly jaded as this one, it would be a delightful read. As for me, perhaps I need to look for my language in the sycamores.