Its easy to think we understand how families in the limelight live their lives, but the reality isn't quite that. very good book showing the other side.

Thanks to the publisher and Netgalley for an eARC of this book.
A story of a senator's infidelity and its effect upon his family. The timeline jumps around but I found it added to the story rather than making it difficult. The points of view of his two daughters is particularly interesting. Recent events made this book even more interesting and pertinent.
The books is well written and readable. I was particularly struck by the ability of this author, a man, to portray the point of view of the daughters so accurately. I had to keep reminding myself that this was written by a man.

<b>The Senator's Children</b> begins with a description of a happy family living in the suburbs of Philadelphia. David Christie is a lawyer, his wife, Danielle is a professor of English at a small liberal arts college. David and Danielle have two kids, Nick and Betsy. As soon as the setting feels comfortable, the chaos begins and stays with the reader to end. David is running for senator and with that campaign the lives of the Christie family changes.

Events and narrators begin frequently switching, giving us a picture of fractured family lives caused by David's choices and tragic accidents. <b>The Senator's Children</b> is a novel of life in current times. Perhaps, the actions of the adults are as old as time, but now we have children who take painful events and turn them around in an attempt at not making the same mistakes. We never want to make the mistakes of our parents. The big question is how to ensure that we don't. Betsy, as an adult, is on the cusp of having a full family life if she wants it. The novel does not give us an answer. We have to hope, and the novel provides us with that hope.

NetGalley and Tin House Books provided the ARC.

Publish date is November 7.

Written in a chaotic, timeline leaping style, we are invited into the personal worlds of a politician, his public family and the child conceived in an affair made public and ignored by her father.

Witness the powerful politician who played to the masses who sympathized with his personal losses as he is catapulted into running for President. We get to know the results of his infidelity, the least of which is his loss of political power as his lack of integrity is unveiled. We read of his family, the devastation of losing a child to drunk driving, the guilt that consumes his wife, her battle with cancer and both of his daughters who have suffered for his actions.

As the timeline rushes forward, we see a shadow of a once vital man, infirm and losing his connection to the world. We see the damage of a public life on the one daughter he acknowledges as well as the one he does not. Betsy torments herself over the loss of her family cocoon, both through the visions of a child and later as an adult still feeling the backlash. Avery grew up in the same brutal spotlight of public voyeurism, while dealing with a man who ignored her existence. This is their life exposed, warts and all and the repercussions of becoming victims of the press, the public and the man who should have cared more for them than himself.

THE SENATOR’S CHILDREN by Nicholas Montemarano is a journey through the lives of flawed humans and their personal hell, no judgements, just a story that allows readers to feel for themselves. Are there monsters? Villains? Victims? Who are they? Are second chances allowed only for a few privileged souls? I know what I think...

I received an ARC edition from Tin House Books in exchange for my honest and voluntary reivew.

Publisher: Tin House Books (November 7, 2017)
Publication Date: November 7, 2017
Genre: Political | Psychological Fiction
Print Length: 300 pages
Available from: Amazon | Barnes & Noble
For Reviews & More: http://tometender.blogspot.com

This is a well-written examination of family relationships, infidelity and the public lives of politicians. The characters are well-drawn and the author shows how major mistakes impact the innocent children.

This novel sort of crept up on me. I began The Senator's Children thinking it was going to be another husband cheats, family dissolves, man gets his comeuppance in the end.
And I guess all the above is true, but this book is so much more. I was truly touched by the end. I never cry while reading, but I struggled with my emotions about time flying by, children leaving, and memories about the past that can't ever be relived.

I really enjoyed this book--the writing was quiet and thoughtful and there was nothing sensationalistic about it, despite its rather "ripped from the headlines" premise. In the end this is a novel about the pain that families cause us, and whether we can learn to live with it.

Well, I think that this book may be the proof positive that Americans may never be able to go back to thinking about politics as they may have been before the recent election cycle and current state of affairs. This book may have been a winner for me a year ago, in fact, I have often enjoyed books about campaigning or political power as a crucial aspect. However, this novel fell very flat for me. The incidents that arose and the plot points that flowed felt very vanilla and uneventful for me.