The Missing One

The Missing One by Lucy Atkins follows Kali and her toddler son on an impulsive trip to Canada after the death of her mother. Kali is trying to find out more about her mother's life around the time she (Kali) was born. I was initially rather put off this book because the lack of contractions in the main narrative made the reading experience feel stilted. But I was interested enough in Kali and her story to keep going for a while. My attention started drifting towards the halfway point, though, as the whole started to feel repetitive and over-wrought, while at the same time not seeming to be going anywhere particularly interesting.

A Spool of Blue Thread

I seem to be struggling with Anne Tyler at the moment...
I gave A Spool of Blue Thread a try but didn't get very far.
The opening chapter is one quite confusing conversation and then almost 50 pages of summary, skimming over about ten years in the history of a particular family.
I didn't connect with any of the characters and wasn't interested enough in their story to want to carry on.