A million reasons why: this book took me by surprise! While I found the writing style enjoyable, I quickly labeled it a little too predictable about halfway through. I’m so glad I stuck with it as the second half kept me continually surprised at what the author introduced.

The story follows two half-sisters who only discover each other’s existence after matching on a DNA test website. The discovery upends one sister’s life while infusing hope and possibility into the other. I especially loved how the author incorporated sensitive mental health issues into the second half of the book, as well as how the character storylines all came together in the end. A great read!

Thank you to NetGalley and St. Martin's Press for the advanced copy. As always, all opinions are my own. I plan on sharing this review on my blog, genthebookworm.com, the week of its release in March 2021.

A DNA test as a Christmas present turns Caroline's world upside down. She discovers that she has a half-sister, and as secrets, lies and hidden truths are uncovered, her world is initially upended, only to be put back together in an utterly satisfying way. There were so many lovingly drawn flowed people in this book, each with their own challenges and sorrows -- it made my heart ache for each of them.

This novel reads so real and it surprised me in so many ways. I've give it ten stars if I could. This is a perfect book to read during a pandemic. Heartfelt, uplifting, gritty and real.

Thanks, #netgalley

I was able to read this pre-release version thanks to Net Galley but all opinions are my own.

This book was engaging from the first page. As someone who enjoyed getting my DNA test results back to see my heritage, I didn't find any surprise relatives like in this story. However, I can imagine what the characters in this story are feeling as they do.

I really like that this story is told from multiple viewpoints with the two women alternating chapters to show their individual views of the situation.

Received my E book copy but for some reason the title was "Too Much To Ask" but it is the same book as "A Million Reasons Why". Not sure why the title is different on mine.

I enjoyed the storyline. A DNA test reveals Caroline has a half sister, Sela, she didn't know about.. After meeting her, she also finds out about family secrets that sent her life down a different path. Sela contacts Caroline, mainly to find out if she is compatible as a kidney donor.. Although the story dragged for me toward the middle, it really picked up at the ending.

I was given this book by NetGalley for an honest review -
Two sisters who had no idea they were sisters find each other through a DNA test. One sister needs a kidney - the other sister has a husband and three children.
A wonderful reunion becomes tense as Caroline wonders if she dares give her sister a kidney, her husband doesn't want this of course worries, and father and mother struggle with this especially with the baggage of these sisters finding each other.
Read along as the sisters get to know each other and the reason they never knew each other before, find out the secret the father and mother have kept, and find out if Caroline will share her kidney with her sister.
A thought provoking, emotional book that you will want to read.

This was my first book by Jessica Strawser and I really enjoyed this one!

I enjoyed the tough subject matter. This one is about two sisters struggling to forge a bond they didn't know they even had. They have to maneuver through infidelity, manipulation and dilemmas that would test anyone.
I'd recommend this one to fans of Jodi Picoult.

Thanks to Netgalley and the publisher St. Martin's Press for my advanced ebook copy.

Well written and absorbing. this was one of the novels that makes you THINK. Nice ending too. Thank you to Netgalley and the publisher!

Wow. This was such an emotional novel! There was a twist at the end that I completely missed and was shocked! Caroline and her family each take a DNA test as a Christmas present and the story takes off. Months later, she gets a notification that she has a half sister. But that can’t be, because she is an only child. Everything she thought she knew about her life thus far was wrong. I really enjoyed the half sister Sela’s chapters and felt so sad that she lost her mother and never had/knew her father. And then on top of that, is suffering from kidney disease. This was a very character driven novel and I could totally see it as a movie.

I received a complimentary copy of A Million Reasons Why from NetGalley. Opinions expressed in this review are entirely my own.

Every family's biggest fear!! Needing to know how the story unfolded, I did not want to put this novel down. Caroline's family is turned upside-down by her half sister, Sela, who is sweet and pure, but whose closest friends have ulterior motives for her finding any possible siblings. This was the first Jessica Strawser book I have read, and I can safely say that I will gladly read more of her work. Great book!

Thank you to NetGalley for the ARC.

A MILLION REASONS WHY
BY JESSICA STRAWSER

The reason why I requested this novel by Jessica Strawser called, "A Million Reasons Why," is because I enjoyed her last book. This one was a lot better but it still like the one called, "Not That I Could Tell," required that I suspend belief also to some extent. I think her writing is getting better and I enjoyed this one more.

Caroline is married to Walt with three children and after having the good luck of him be helpful in doing half of the Christmas shopping. He picks out DNA kits for the whole family and extended family to take as Christmas presents. Caroline gets an email from Sela who claims to be her half sister. Caroline and Walt have both been raised as only children that's why they have had three children: two girls and a boy.

Caroline's life is so complex because of her mother's interference in many ways which gave the book depth. No spoilers since saying anymore would ruin the novel's premise which is interesting. There is so much for the reader to sift through. Sela has kidney problems, although she isn't at end stage renal failure yet but Caroline's husband Walt suspects that Sela's reason for wanting to get in touch with Caroline is solely for Caroline to donate one of her kidney's. Sela doesn't broach the topic with Caroline or her family at all during their first or second meetings. I enjoyed the sister's attempts at having a normal relationship. I loved Caroline for her warmth and being the only one on her father's side of the family to acknowledge Sela's existence. I would recommend this novel to fans of contemporary fiction involving family and other relationship's in all of their complexities. A solid 4 star read from me.

Publication Date: March 23, 2021

Thank you to Net Galley, Jessica Strawser and St. Martin's Press for generously providing me with my ARC in exchange for a fair and honest review. All opinions are my own.

#AMillionReasonsWhy #JessicaStrawser #StMartinsPress #NetGalley

A tale of a young woman dying of kidney failure and how she finds the sister she never knew she had.
Family secrets and and cover ups nearly destroy several lives in this captivating novel. Most of it was a real page turner! However, I thought the last two chapters were weak and the ending disappointing.

This was an interesting book. Caroline is married with three children. The book starts with her receiving an e-mail from a potential half-sister by the name of Sela. Caroline’s family had received DNA test kits for Christmas, and Sela had also used one for health reasons: She has kidney disease and will eventually need a transplant. She has no family and is hoping to find a relative who might be willing to donate their kidney. There is a lot going on in this book. The author weaves an amazing story around Caroline and Sela, as well as their extended family and friends. She touches on the difficult and heartbreaking issues that revolve around organ transplantation. There are also secrets in this family, which definitely come to light with Sela’s e-mail to Caroline. There were many times that I just couldn’t put this book down. The ending was just beautiful. I had imagined several scenarios, but not what actually happened. I do need to say that Walt was my favorite character. He was frequently doing the wrong thing for the right reason, but unlike most people, he always figured it out in the end and atoned for his behavior. Thank you to NetGalley for providing me with this ARC in exchange for my honest review.

If your looking for a family twister - this is it! Two women linked by DNA and the probability that one can save the other - although everything is not as it seems. Author does a great job of deftly dealing with two sensitive topics while at the same time keeps the plot twisting!
Thank you so much for the advance of this book. If it doesn’t get 5 stars it is only because part of the story line was a little heavier than anticipated although I will definitely look for more from this author.

Overall, "A Million Reasons Why" is a good book. There is a plot twist late in the book that I strongly disliked and I contemplated reducing my rating to only 3 stars, but the author finishes the story on a strong note, so I stayed with my original intended 4 star rating.

Caroline's husband Walt purchased DNA test kits for the family for Christmas. He thought it would be harmless fun and the most that would come out of the testing was some interesting information about family heritage. However, months later, out of the blue, Caroline receives an e-mail from a woman named Sela claiming to be her half-sister. This cannot possibly be true because her parents were college sweethearts, married soon after college, and it was not long before they had Caroline, their one and only child. Yet, when Caroline confronts her parents, she discovers that her father did have a brief affair and that she does have a half-sister. This revelation upends the family and causes Caroline to question other events in her life, as Sela lives in a North Carolina town where Caroline, years earlier, had a promising job prospect that unexpectedly and inexplicably fell through at the last minute. Not only would landing the job have resulted in a vastly different life for Caroline, but she might have inadvertently met Sela and/or Rebecca, Sela's mother.

While Walt had purchased the DNA test kits on a lark, Sela had a much more important motive. She has stage 3 (of 5) kidney disease and has the misfortune of having body chemistry that makes finding a match for a donor kidney incredibly difficult. Because kidney disease can progress rather quickly and the search for a viable donor kidney can be very lengthy, patients are encouraged to start looking for possible donor matches long before they actually need a new kidney. Sela's mother (who has since passed away), her mother's side of the family, Sela's husband, and her friends are not matches. Rebecca (Ecca) refused to talk about Sela's father and forbade Sela from trying to find him, but a familial match is her best hope, so she got the DNA testing in hopes of finding an unknown half sibling -- her father, if he could be found, was unlikely to be a good candidate based on his age, and Sela was not sure she wanted to know him anyway.

Sela is not comfortable asking someone to donate their kidney to her, but is being heavily pressured by her husband and best friend to form a relationship with Caroline and make the request that Caroline be tested. When Caroline responds to the e-mail and indicates an interest in getting to know Sela, Sela starts to contemplate whether she can make the request. After learning more about the risks to the donor, Sela decided she cannot make the request, but she still wants to pursue a possible friendship with Caroline. She has kept her kidney disease secret from Caroline, but during a weekend visit with Caroline and her family, Sela fails to follow the strict protocols required to keep her disease stable and she experiences a medical emergency that forces her to reveal her condition. Caroline's husband, Walt, immediately jumps to the conclusion that Sela's only interest in Caroline is as a potential kidney donor. Caroline and Walt had kept Sela's visit hidden from her parents, who did not want her to contact Sela, but at a family gathering, one of her children mentions "Aunt Sela" and an already fraught situation becomes more turbulent. However, the more Caroline's family insists that donating a kidney is not an option, the more Caroline wants to at least learn about the process.

The author does a wonderful job of portraying the difficulties of managing kidney disease, especially in the later stages, the difficulty of making the transplant list and finding a compatible match, and the points system for determining where a patient is on the list and the likelihood of finding a donor. She also does a great job of portraying the internal turmoil experienced by a patient who has to ask others to consider being a kidney donor, knowing that a new kidney will not cure the kidney disease, so the patient might need another kidney at a future date; knowing that the transplant might not work, so the donor has faced all the risks essentially for nothing; knowing all of the risks that the donor faces, including the risk that the donor's remaining kidney might one day fail and the donor will end up on the transplant list. The author also explores the thoughts and fears of potential donors, both people like Caroline, who are considering donating to a relative, but also altruistic donors -- people who agree to be living donors to whomever is a compatible match.

The story also deals with what it means to be a family, how to forgive family members for their failings, and the lengths people will go to in order to "protect" their family, even if their idea of what is best for specific family members is wrong.

I received a copy of the e-book via NetGalley in exchange for a review.

Excellent heartfelt novel about what defines a family. When Caroline’s husband gifts the entire family a DNA test kit for Christmas he has no idea what he started. When the results come back and Caroline finds that she may have a close relative that she had no idea existed due to family lies and coverups the fallout could change things forever. Beautifully written novel of forgiveness, loss and what it means to be a family. Loved this book so much, it will definitely stay with me for a long time to come.

I received an ARC of this novel from Netgalley in exchange for an honest review.

A Christmas gift of a DNA test links two women as half sisters. The drama that unfolds is riveting on many levels as the supporting characters grapple with their roles and guilt.

Loving ending.

Sela's life has crumbled with one devastating loss after another and she is in desperate need of a kidney donation when a DNA test reveals she has a half sister she never knew she had. Caroline has a beautifully full life, and she always thought she was an only child, so the email that tells her she has a half sister somewhere is both shocking and exciting. Jessica Strawser's book explores what we owe our families and book clubs will find plenty to discussion in A Million Reasons Why.

n Jessica Strawser's A MILLION REASONS WHY, two half-sisters are thrown together in adulthood by the surprising results of a DNA test, sending seismic ripples through their own lives and the lives of their loved ones. Book clubs and fans of Jodi Picoult will devour this beautiful and complex novel about the shifting bonds of family and the impossible questions life poses to all of us, at one time or another. Through richly drawn characters and a few satisfying plot twists, Strawser handles difficult questions with thoughtful, page-turning prose. A must-read!

The life of someone with kidney disease is well told in this story of Sela and Caroline.

The entire 3-generation family dynamic is in for a shake-up when the family Christmas gift of DNA kits results turns up a half sister Caroline never knew about. Reconciling their past with the present creates drama that kept this novel moving at a steady pace.

I definitely enjoyed this latest Jessica Strawser creation.

When DNA testing reveals that Caroline and Sela are half-sisters, their lives are changed forever. Sela suffers from chronic kidney disease and is in desperate need of a kidney donor - but how can she make that request of a half-sister she’s just met? Caroline’s parents want nothing to do with Sela - can Caroline get to know her without losing the rest of her family?

I love family dramas, and I’ve recently read a few books about secret half-siblings discovered via DNA testing. This story felt the most compelling to me, probably because Caroline and Sela are drawn well, with lots of complexities and secrets in their lives. The plot moved quickly, alternating perspectives between the sisters to fill out the story. There were a few plot twists I didn’t see coming that kept the story from feeling trite or predictable.

If you like family dramas or need a good cry, I’d recommend this book. it’s a relatively quick read but packs quite an emotional punch.

Thank you to St. Martin’s Press for providing an ARC on NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.