What a beautiful, epic story. I bought the book for both my mother-in-law and daughter! This is a story for all generations.

Both a story of the American dream and a history of America from the past several decades, this book had me enraptured at the tale of Bethie and Jo, two Jewish sisters growing up in Detroit. Bethie is the quintessential good girl, eager to please her teachers and her family. Jo is the rebellious one, always different, and always angering their traditional mother. This book was an absolutely stunning portrayal of how women's roles have changed and evolved over the past 50 years.

"She loved [her daughters]. More than that, she admired them. They would be better than she was: stronger and smarter, more capable and less afraid, and if the world displeased them, they would change it, cracking it open, reshaping it, instead of bending themselves to its demands."

Both girl's paths diverge wildly over the course of the book and Jo and Bethie both end up in very unlikely places. Real-life events are interwoven into this very poignant story, giving it almost a non-fiction feel. Although I had the Kindle version, I highly recommend the audio book as the narrators literally made me feel I was listening to a riveting movie.

Several traumatic events occur, which change the sisters' lives irrevocably. But through it all, they remain devoted and fiercely loyal to each other. My heart broke for both Bethie and for Jo, for very different reasons. This was my first book by Jennifer Weiner and I was absolutely transfixed! I loved the references to the 60s and 70s and this book brought back many memories. It also gave me insight into how far women have come in this country, and how far we have to go.

"We lose ourselves,” she repeated, forming each word with care, “but we find our way back.”

Jennifer Weiner is now one of my must-read authors. I felt like Bethie and Jo and the rest of the main characters in this book were actually real people! And there is no greater compliment to an author than that.

Unfortunately I was unable to finish this one. I typically am a Jennifer Weiner fan but this just wasn’t for me.

Mrs. Everything focuses on two sisters, Bethie and Jo, spanning the entirety of their lives. The story focuses on the sisters' individual difficulties and their family discord they had growing up in the late 1900s. It was amazing to follow them through the years and see how much their situations change. There were a lot of heavy topics in this book such as rape, gender inequality, sexual repression. However, Jennifer Weiner did a great job of not making the story too heavy and an extremely enjoyable read.

This was my first Jennifer Weiner book and I can't believe how long it took me to find her! In the Author's Note I found out that this was her version of Little Women which made me love this book even more.

This story was heavier than I anticipated. I love a good book with difficult themes, but this came unexpected and threw me off from the story a bit. But all in all, I thought this was a fantastic novel, and I look forward to reading more from this author.

Rating this book is a struggle for me, because I almost abandoned it multiple times. I found myself bored at times, and frustrated with the characters. It was not a happy, warm-fuzzy feeling one got by reading it the majority of the time. However, the overall message of the book about women's struggles of all kinds throughout history was very real and thought-provoking. Not to mention that Weiner truly created a book that seemed to be a complete biography of two sisters. If you told me at the very end they weren't actually fictional women, I would probably believe you. For this reason, I can see why so many have rated this book so highly. I am glad that I read it, but also very glad to have finished it.

This book is so relatable! There are deep rooted relationships, hardship, pain, joy, etc. The feelings are intense. The characters are not just likeable, but loveable. Quite an enjoyable journey!

I was extremely excited for this book and was a bit let down by it! Besides it being quite the investment of time, I felt like the story dragged a bit and didn’t activate my attention as much as other novels Weiner has written. I understand that this was a different way of writing than she normally pursues, and it is well executed, but just not what I had anticipated. Sadly, I have picked up and tried to continue reading this book for over three months now, and have decided to not finish reading it. It weighs heavy on my soul, and this will be the first book I have not finished, so I don’t take this decision lightly.

Jennifer Weiner just went next level with this one! I’ve enjoyed her previous books, but this one blew me away. I loved following these two sisters from childhood all the way through their lives. I loved that they were outwardly so completely different, but the root of their internal struggles was basically the same. Loved being on their journey with them, crying for them, rooting for them, and watching things come full circle. Fantastic read- can’t wait to see what Jennifer Weiner does next!

This was so different than any Jennifer Weiner book I've read -- in a good way! I don't have a sister, but the relationship between the sisters in the book felt so real to me. It's the truth of how family works: you fight, you make up, you disagree, you don't talk for days/weeks/months or you talk every day...but regardless, you're there for each other, no matter what.

This is a story about two women learning how to live their truths, whatever they make look like, despite any mistakes or regrets. It's a beautiful story of friendship and sisterhood.

Two sisters growing up in a suburban neighborhood are as different as night and day. The time frame starts in the 1950’s. They have an ideal family with a father who adores them both and a mom who is strict and who expects conformity and tradition.
Jo is the oldest and her tomboy ways are a real irritant to her mother, Sarah. Sarah definitely favors Bethie, who is perfect in every way.
Life is never perfect, situations change, and the unexpected happens. Their lives are forever changed and choices made by the two sisters in their youth will forever effect their course in life.
I loved how Jennifer Weiner brings the reader along as the sisters go through their teen years to becoming senior citizens. I enjoyed each and every character and loved how the author wove the story through time . I remember being a child in the 1950’s and the attitudes and prejudices towards women and minorities was spot on in this novel. I was totally absorbed in this story from start to finish.

4 stars*,

It had been years since I had read a Jennifer Weiner book. When I noticed Mrs. Everything as an option on NetGalley I leapt at the chance to review it

I thoroughly enjoyed this story. A family saga told in turns in the voices of sisters Jo and Bethie, Mrs. Everything stretches across three generations. It begins with sisters Jo & Bethie as pre-schoolers in the late 1940s, relating their observations of growing up in a mixed community in Detroit. From as far back as she can remember, Jo knows that she frustrates her mother and can't seem to do anything to please her. She hates dresses and everything that girls are supposed to like and prefers climbing trees and being loud and playing outside. She tells about her special relationship with her father, who she relates to so well and who seems to understand and accept her "tomboyishness" in a way her mother cannot.

The tale takes you through the girls' vastly differing coming of age circumstances, their perceptions of the same events, including the unexpected loss of their father before they are grown. Suddenly needing to all pitch in, their mother has to find a job for the first time in her life and Jo is forced to find a job herself while Bethie is offered the chance to help out in the home of their father's brother. The uncle's inappropriate behavior toward Bethie, and her inability to speak up result in emotional and relational issues for all of the women in the family.

As the women age, we watch them maneuver through their relationships with their lovers, their friends, their communities and each other.

It is also a story of womanhood and the space women are permitted to take up in a family, in a community, in the world.

I really like this one. Recommended!

*with thanks to NetGalley for the digital ARC in exchange for this honest review.

I didn't love this offering as a whole. Parts were great but I thought it was way too long and reading about the sister's self destruction was a bit much at times.

I am a lover of most Jennifer Weiner novels but this one was not for me. I didn't love the relationship between the sisters but I did love the historical aspect of the book - it almost felt like historical fiction! I'd recommend this to others, I don't think it was for me though.

Thank you to Atria Books for providing me with a copy of Jennifer Weiner’s latest novel, Mrs. Every-Thing, in exchange for an honest review.

In Mrs. Everything, bestselling author Jennifer Weiner explores the lives of the Kaufman sisters, Jo and Bethie. Although they are very different women, the Kaufman sisters are close, until Bethie is raped. The guilt, miscommunication, and things that go unspoken drives a wedge between the sisters and they spend most of their lives struggling to repair their relationship.

Mrs. Every-Thing is an epic story that begins in the 1950’s and spans decades, following Bethie and Jo through their childhood to their golden years. Weiner tackles many of the heavy themes of those decades, including feminism, civil rights, and gays rights. Her characters are in the thick of it.

Jo seems to follow a more traditional path, marrying young and becoming a mother. She lives in the suburbs of Connecticut and outwardly reflects the attitudes of a conservative housewife. However, she is hiding a relationship that she had with a female classmate in college, a love that has never died. She carries the burden of not feeling that she can live her authentic-self, as she tries to maintain a happy home for her children, while her marriage is crumbling.

Bethie takes a different path. After being sexually assaulted, she turns to an alternative, hippie lifestyle of the 60’s and lives on a commune. She is wary of marrying or having kids, but is vocal in her passion to promote feminism. She eventually realizes that she has a desire to be an entrepreneur, which is in conflict with the ideals of the commune, so she leaves and becomes a successful businesswoman. She also finds love with an black man in an time not long after the civil rights era.

Admittedly, in the hands of a different writer, the topics covered in Mrs. Every-Thing, may have come across as cliche. However, Weiner is a masterful storyteller and she has created two compelling protagonists. The tale of the Kaufman sisters is a page turner and I was engaged for the entire ride. It made me consider my own life path as a child of the late 70’s and how different my options have been from those of my mom and aunt, who were both born just a decade prior to Jo and Bethie. We often judge the world and the people living in it from the standards of now, however people are very much a product of the era in which they were raised. Our world is constantly changing and every generation has unique challenges. Through hindsight, I can now see just in my lifetime how far we have come with regard to inclusion and rights, yet how far we need to go. The story of the Kaufman sisters is look at a few pivotal decades in American history and moreover, what it meant to be female during that time.

I highly recommend Mrs. Every-Thing and Weiner’s other novels. She’s a talented writer!

Thanks to Netgalley and the publisher for an advance copy of this novel in exchange for an honest review.

I should preface this review by noting that I am a huge Jennifer Weiner fan and have been for years. This novel was so good, it might have just become my favorite if I'm being honest. Sometimes there are books that suck me and don't let me breathe without them and then there are ones that slowly absorb you and you find yourself reading bits at a time to savor it, this is definitely the latter for me. This is a dual perspective novel that focuses on being a woman and also on the bond between sisters Jo and Bethie Kaufman. The book opens with Jo in 2015 finding out her breast cancer had returned and then the reader is immediately transported back to 1951 Detroit when Jo and Bethie are small children. The book follows the sisters through the 50s and turbulent 60s and 70s and ending in the present. Each girl must reevaluate what it means to be a woman and their place in the world after each going through some life altering events, for Jo this means dealing her with sexuality in a time and place where to be gay was not an option and Bethie deals with the way she is used by men in the world.

I love Weiner even though every book she has published has left me sobbing, her works are so real and evocative. I loved this book because of the relationship between the sisters and how realistically it is depicted, I can't recommend this book enough!

Mrs. Everything by Jennifer Weiner is a historical women’s fiction novel that takes place over more than half of a century. After a brief glimpse in a more current time of 2015 the book then takes readers back to the 1950s to begin following the lives of two sisters, Jo and Bethie Kaufman, by changing the point of view between them with each chapter.

Jo and Bethie’s story begins in 1951 in Detroit as their family of four are moving into a better neighborhood and you immediately see just how different the two girls are. Jo is the older of the sisters and somewhat of the wild, more outspoken of the two while Bethie then was the opposite.

As we watch the girls grow they encounter many obstacles along the way. Many of these issues are exactly what you’d expect of the era in which things are happening. Things were very different for women back then and as the years pass you see many of the events that shaped the world during that time not only for women but everyone. As the years pass what happens to the girls shapes each of their lives and where their paths take them.

I didn’t want to be too specific with the events that take place in this book but I would warn some content may be a little too much for everyone so take caution. Learning just how far the author planned to take two different characters lives I was a bit skeptical it could be done with enough depth through the years to truly know them and I’m happy to say I shouldn’t have been concerned. Jennifer Weiner did such a wonderful job not only going deep into the characters but surprisingly enough keeping the setting/timeline feeling authentic along the way. Definitely a book I’d recommend picking up and giving a try.

I received an advance copy from the publisher via NetGalley.

I thought that the idea of reading about someone’s entire life span would be boring, but this book was very interesting. I love the author.

So much love for this book! My first Jennifer Weiner book, but am so glad she is prolific with an long backlist to read so I won't be on pins and needles awaiting her next. This book spans follows two sisters as they come of age through the '50's and '60's. It is the classic situation of one sister being the beauty and the other being a tomboy, reminiscent of Little Women. The book takes many twists and turns and covers an array of topics including homosexuality, interracial marriage, abortion, incest, and more.
Highly recommend!

Discussed on Book Cougars Podcast Episode 76, 77, and 78.
www.bookcougars.com/blog-1

I tried this author many years ago and thought I just didn't like her books. I was a wrong reader way back then too.
So I saw this book starting to pop up and people were liking it. I'm a total peer pressure caver and requested it. Then realized I didn't like this author. Then realized I was stupid. Then I started reading it anyways.
………...and it blew my dress up.

I REALLY liked this book.
It tells the life story of two sisters. Jo and Bethie Kaufman. It starts in the 1950's and takes you through these girls growing up years. Jo is a tomboy who just can't seem to please her mom no matter what. Bethie is that perfect girlie girl who pleases everyone.

Then life steps in and changes these girls and you are right beside them every step of the way.

These characters were so real that at times I would get frustrated with them and then want to keep reading because I actually missed them. I miss them now that the book is over for me. I love when an author is able to do that.
This story may have been so fond for me because it took me back to the growing up years I had. I didn't have similar circumstances to Jo and Bethie but I could totally relate to them.

Now the book is very pro woman which as a woman I can appreciate too.


Even though I got bashed to dang death on one stupid book that I didn't like because it was over the top. (view spoiler)
THIS is such a more thought out and much better written testament to what was and is growing up female.


I totally recommend this one and this is from the chick who has barely cracked a book in the last couple of years. I'm mad because I'm done with this one.


Booksource: Netgalley in exchange for review.

What a fantastic read with a great message! I truly enjoyed this book. I loved travelling through the years with these two sisters and reading about their lives.