I just discovered this author recently and I'm really enjoying reading her books. Her writing style draws you in and her characters really come to life. I hate to say it, but the plot is almost secondary to the people. Thank you to the publisher and Netgalley for the advance copy of the book in exchange for an honest review.

Great beach story! I love the humor and honesty evolved throughout the 2 generations of women. After reading you feel that anything and everything is possible.

Emma London was a teen mom, and she's raised an awesome daughter, Riley. Emma's own mother committed suicide, and her father is a ne'er do well trust-fund baby. Emma was sent to live with her cold and reproving grandmother who kicked her out when she found out she was pregnant - but now Gigi is dying and bribes Emma to visit. Can Emma and Genevieve reconcile after seventeen years of cold silence?

Kristan Higgins has done it again - I couldn't put this book down. The characters have unique voices and there were some very unexpected twists. The family drama was extremely entertaining - Life and Other Inconveniences is a study of how our parents or caregivers can really mess us up, or how they can make us stronger.

I have really enjoyed Kristan's other books so I was really excited to read this and it didn't disappoint. Kristan wrote so well about the complicated family relationship in the book and I found myself having sympathy for all the characters in the book, even ones that I initially hated. Kristan has such a nice, breezy way of writing that I zipped through this really quickly and was very disappointed when it ended.

Kristan Higgins always come through for the reader with emotional reads in women's fiction. The character development in her novels is flawless. However, this novel lacked the romantic element that I have enjoyed from many of her other novels (including my all-time favorite, Too Good To Be True).

I've read Kristan Higgins before, I know, but that was years ago. Have her recent books all been this good? Because...man.

Emma London has a shit for a dad. When her mother commits suicide, Emma is left with her grandmother, Genevieve, a wealthy, snobby woman who lost her son when he was just a small boy. Ten years after that day, Emma finds that she's pregnant with her high school boyfriend's child and, when she tells her grandmother, Genevieve kicks her out of the house.

It's hard to imagine liking Genevieve after that. She's cold, she's critical, and she seems vicious. But, as we learn, people deal with heartbreak in different ways, and Genevieve has only done what she could to move through the pain of losing her favorite son (hint: it's not Emma's dad). When Genevieve tells Emma that she's dying and asks Emma and her daughter, Riley, to come to Connecticut for the summer, we get to learn more about the woman she is and the woman she had hoped to be.

Every single character is real. Emma is mostly portrayed as flawless, but she's likable, nonetheless. There's a bit of a "Gilmore Girls" feel to her relationship with her daughter, but it's never obnoxious like the Rory and Lorelei Gilmore often were, much to my relief. Genevieve is difficult, but we can understand why that's the case. Emma's father is horrible, but we can understand that, too. These people are real life and I felt like I knew them by the time the book was finished.

One gripe: Tess, the daughter of widower Miller Finlay (Emma's love interest). Three-year-old children are unpredictable and will frequently cause their parents to want to run screaming from the room, but this child...oof. Her language skills were advanced for a child her age, and there was no apparent reason for her over-the-top antics. Acting out because one's parent has died is believable, but the death of Tess's mother, and how it affects Tess, isn't ever discussed. She's just an awful, awful child. Not bad enough, though, for me to feel anything but love for this book. Seriously.

Ever since Emma's mother committed suicide when Emma was eight, and her father subsequently dropped her off at her grandmother's to stay permanently, life has not been easy. Emma's grandmother, the great Fashion Guru Genevieve London, has always been distant, never really getting over the loss of her young son and subsequently her husband several years later. But for ten years she raises Emma, until one day Emma, now 18, winds up pregnant and insists on keeping the baby, Riley, at the expense of college and all her grandmothers plans.

Fast forward seventeen years, Emma and Riley are now living with Emma's grandfather (on the other side of the family) and haven't spoken to Genevieve since, until one day quite unexpectedly, Emma receives a call from her. She's dying and wants to see Emma and meet Riley for the first time. So they spend the summer in her Connecticut mansion, and see another side of Genevieve while making new friends along the way.

This is a beautiful story with so much heart to it. Kristin's writing makes you feel like you are there at Sheerwater experiencing the beauty of the place right alongside Emma and Riley. It's told mostly through the perspectives of Emma and Genevieve but also occasionally will be from a supporting characters point of view, which I found I actually really liked.

It was so easy to connect to all the characters, and it had me rooting for them as I learned about their pasts, and why they are the way that they are now in the present. It will make you laugh and cry. If the beginning seems somewhat slow, stick around to the end and trust me, you'll be glad you did.

This is an overwhelming book of sadness, complicated pasts and tragedy. It seemed every character had a depressing story. Told in first person by multiple characters, readers will slowly get to the major secret. If readers are looking for an uplifting story they need to look elsewhere.

I can't even lie, Kristan Higgins has been a go-to for contemporary for me for a long time. I can't even pretend that I thought there was a chance I'd hate this.

And I didn't!

With her typical character perfection, engaging plot, and humor...this is one I won't forget anytime soon.

https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/42166299-life-and-other-inconveniences

Meh....I disliked way more than I liked. Makes me sad because I thought her last book was mediocre too. Hate the need to have to throw in all the politically correct crap. Tess, the toddler, was a brat from hell. What toddler tells their parent they hate them all the time and put poop in things???? Seriously? And Genevieve was truly just an ugly human. She has written much better books.

Higgins is now officially one of my favorite authors! Her characters are well defined and act in a way true to their personalities, and their relationships, often messy, are real and relatable. Emma lived with her grandmother, Genevieve, after the death of her own mother. Kicked out at 18 after getting pregnant, Emma makes a life for herself, but is called back to Connecticut and the family mansion by her grandmother. Her daughter Riley is also at a crossroads, and Emma decides to return. What follows is what makes the story so heartfelt. Highly recommend. Thanks to Netgalley for the ARC.

If you like Kristan Higgins, you won't be disappointed! This was a heartwarming story & I loved the characters.

Kristan Higgins, what can you say? When I pick up a KH, I know that I will have an excellent story that will break my heart and put it back together again upon completion of the book. This book was no exception.

Ultimately, though this book deals with some really heavy subjects and plot points, it is supremely hopeful and excellent. I wholeheartedly recommend this title to anyone who loves Higgins, strong women's fiction with romantic elements, and emotional reads.

Kristan Higgins is one of my very favorite summer reading authors and I was thrilled to have the opportunity to read an advanced reader copy of her August 2019 book release. Life and Other Inconveniences is a heartwarming story that is filled with family dynamics, love, heartache, and hope.

Life and Other Inconveniences involves four generations of a family, the ties that bind and the complexities of past choices and how they affect relationships today. Higgin's offers multidimensional characters, diverse relationships and the ability to weave real-life issues into her plotlines.

While this is a fun and engaging read, Higgins is also able to provide a level of depth that makes her writing thought-provoking and satisfying. Higgin's ability to share these stories from multiple different perspectives allows you as the reader to see where these characters are coming from, even if you don't always agree with their choices.

In order to move forward, we must often look back at the choices and decisions we have made and Higgins excels at presenting this story in such a powerful and multilayered way. The ending of this book is bittersweet and real, which I find much more satisfying than a "happily ever after" scenario.

Thank you to NetGalley and Berkley Publishing for a copy of this book in exchange for an honest review.

Love and heartache are often intertwined. In Life and Other Inconveniences we experience it all through the relationships of strong, independent women over generations. The characters were well developed--some you loved instantly, others we had to grow to love, and others left us disappointed. A heart-warming story that you just want to curl up with over a cup of tea. Have some tissue ready!

Kristan Higgins just never disappoints and continues to astound with her understanding or relationships of every kind, love in its many forms, and friendships that never quit. "Life and other Inconveniences" is another wonderful story of the ties that bind when life and tragedy happen to disrupt. As always, Kristan's characters are real and well rounded, fallible, lovable and flawed. You can't help but love them because no one is a caricature and everyone has a story. I love all of Kristan's books (full disclosure) but I most appreciate the new depths she plumbs in every subsequent book. And, as always, I want to run out and get a dog (and I'm a cat person!).

In addition, Kristan has been a huge champion of diversity in romance and I love, love, love that she interweaves so many diverse characters into her books - without ever making anyone a token.

I was crying at the end of this - not just sad tears about the story line but happy ones at the strength of these characters and their hard won HEA. This book will stay with me for a very long time. Brava, Kristan!

In this novel, Higgins explores the complex relationships between caregivers and their children, as four generations of one family reflect on their past as the failing health of the family matriarch looms large. Emma London's grandmother, Genevieve, raised her after her father walked out of her life, following the suicide of Emma's mother, but Genevieve also kicked out Emma as a pregnant 19 year old. Genevieve has never fully recovered the disappearance of her oldest son when he was just 8 years old. Emma's daughter, Riley, has never met her glamorous grandmother before this summer, and she's also busy meeting her own father's new family. Kristan Higgins has a gift for creating fully developed characters with real world problems that aren't Happily Ever Aftered away. The relationships and conclusions in this book felt wholly earned. Highly recommended.

This was a book I couldn't put down. It was, in turn, heartwarming, poignant and sad. There are many backstories, but at the center is a flawed family, with secrets with a lot to learn and to forgive. The characters were very well-drawn and believable. I particularly liked the kindness and caring in Riley, the teenager. All in all, a time well spent.

The phone call from Emma’s estranged grandmother rocks the life she has painstakingly built for herself and her teenaged daughter Riley. Genevieve’s news of her terminal illness coincide with summer break and Ril.ey’s troubles with mean girls at her school, so Emma opts to move Riley back to the town that rejected her when she was a pregnant teenager.

This story, told from multiple perspectives of a dysfunctional and lonely family, initially seems to have too many big issues to wind together: The disappearance of Genevieve’s son when he was a young child, the suicide of Emma’s mother, Emma’s deadbeat dad, Emma’s teenage pregnancy, and working to put herself through college and are for her baby, Genevieve’s devastating illness and other secrets, and a new romance. By the end of the story, however, each piece settles into place and the story of a family who’s choices made from anger and sadness settle into a bittersweet conclusion.

Wonderful book by Higgins. I thoroughly enjoyed watching the characters and their relationships evolve. I would definitely recommend to others.