I had high hopes for this one - but it wasn't a home run for me like I expected. I kept needing to put it down because it couldn't quite keep my interest. It definitely had it's moments (which is why I didn't DNF this), but I wanted so much more than this delivered.

Let me start by saying this is an AMAZING book, successfully jumping timelines and generations in two families from Flint, Michigan and portraying the history of the city in an engaging, emotionally meaningful and factual way. I'm one of those people who paid attention to Flint, Michigan pretty much since I saw Roger and Me years ago and I read the news stories over the course of the devastating, corrupt decisions to change the city's water source in 2014 with tragic and completely preventable results. The water was not safe. Many residents were affected. Children's lead levels increased and lies went on and on about the safety of the water, exacerbating the health issues and causing at least 90 deaths. The remediation for this continues, and is expected to be completed in 2022. This period is artfully covered through a young family's experiences their fears, their flight from Flint, the tension in their relationship and the aftermath, taking us all the way to 2022.

Chevy in the Hole was the site of the huge GM plants, making Chevrolets, auto parts and more. A sit-down strike in the late 1930s is resulted in the recognition of the United Autoworkers transforming it from a group of small locals. The Detroit music scene partially originated in and partially spilled over into Flint. It has had its share of racial conflict/riots, significant urban decay, and what seems like rolling, irreversible economic losses. Flint still struggles, but Ronan gifts us the story of a city that is home to families who made their ways through strikes, plant shut downs, political and racial conflict, weather disasters, water disasters as she weaves the complexity of the and ups and downs of Flint over eighty plus years with the complexity of people, relationships, family, personal loss, and sometimes but not always, personal redemption.

I first listened to the audio version of Chevy in the Hole and it was a beautifully produced/narrated version. But when I realized that characters from different parts of the story were different generations of two different families, popping up as children here, young women working there, deceased grandmothers and ne'er do well stepfathers, I wanted to read it as well. And reading it was equally satisfying. The novel opens in 2014, with August "Gus" Malloy returning home to Flint from Detroit after he dramatically disrupts a six year period of sobriety by taking who knows what drug and collapsing at work (a restaurant) as his manager imagines the negative Yelp reviews and meals he'll have to comp. As usual, Gus crashes with his long suffering sister Annie. Along the way, Gus volunteers at an urban community farm where he meets Monae, an African American college student intern, helps his mother Rose clean out his grandmother's house and tries to find his way.

All of these people then populate the book with their relatives, deceased and alive, over different periods in Flint history with each period popping with the stories of its time and its people. Ultimately, the stories of Flint and these families cover from 1937 to 2022. I love Ronan's take on a famous story about a night of debauchery in 1967 Flint, when Keith Moon of The Who turned twenty-one. That night flashes in and out of the lives of some of characters connected or related to our two central families so you get a pretty good picture of how crazy it was and but through the eyes of these guests who are tangential to the party and central to our story.

We come to understand what shaped Gus and Monae. We find compassion for some pretty unlikeable people along the way even though they caused enough hurt and dysfunction to travel through the generations ping ponging to hit one child and not another, to gift resilience and strength to some and addiction and early death to others, to make some very careful with their feelings and love. And always they are living an an ever changing backdrop of Flint history. Read it. It's really not hard to follow once you get the rhythm of this exceptional debut. The stories are compelling and entertaining. It is a can't put it down book.

A slow but moving read with two main characters you passionately want to succeed interspersed with chapters about their family members from previous generations. It was a little confusing at times, and sometimes broke the rhythm of the story with the two MCs. But it did help set the stage for the generational traumas both the characters and the city of Flint faced. A worthy read.

I wanted to love this story so much more than I did. As a Michigander, I have an affinity for all things related to the Great Lakes State, and generational family stories are my favorite kind of stories, but the writing in this story led to some confusion, hard to follow storylines and I think that unfortunately, it can only be really enjoyed by people who love Michigan. As someone who grew up around the Flint/Saginaw area, the descriptions of the setting, which are very important to the story, are just not enough for someone who isn’t familiar with the area. I loved a lot of it, just not all of it.

3. 5 stars, rounded up. Chevy in the Hole is Kelsey Ronan’s debut novel. I love strong working class fiction, and the title and book cover spoke to me. But while it shows a good deal of promise, it’s also a cautionary example of how, in trying to do too much, one can do too little. My thanks go to Net Galley and Henry Holt for the review copies. This book is for sale today.

The protagonists are Gus Molloy, who is Caucasian, and Monae Livingston, who is Black. The book opens as Gus is being revived with Narcan on the floor of a dirty restroom in Detroit. We follow him as he meets Monae, a student working at a farm outside of Flint. Their stories are told alternately with bits and pieces of the lives of their predecessors.

The story is promoted as a love letter to Flint, and a tribute to the resilience of its people; it’s a story of “love and betrayal, race and family.” And we do surely see all of those things, but as soon as one aspect or another is touched on, I wink and poof, it’s gone. Gus and Monae are both sympathetic characters, and I can’t help pulling for them, but I suspect the author could have developed them more fully had we not spent so much time and detail on fragments of their parents, grandparents and so on.

If the author’s purpose is to use these characters from the past to showcase the various struggles through which Flint has gone—sit-down strikes, Civil Rights marches, and now, this horrifying industrial sludge that has polluted the town’s drinking water—it could have been done in a paragraph or two, or through some other device than shifting the point of view. The frequent changes of character and time period make it confusing as heck, particularly while listening to the audio version; that’s a shame, because Janina Edwards is a warm, convincing reader.

But we frequently shift from one protagonist to the other, even after they are married, and all of these people from the past have to be sorted by both time period, and by which protagonist they are related to. A story like this should flow. As it is, it’s work listening to it, and had I not been granted a digital review copy as well to refer to, I might have given up.

My other frustration is that both the labor history and the Civil Rights issues—with Black people shut out of company housing in the past, and the issues with cop violence as well as the pollution that is visited most within the Black community—are huge. The pollution problem is immense, and ties back into both of the other issues. This book could be a powerhouse, a call for change to reward to the plucky souls that have stuck with this place through hell and high, toxic water. Instead they present almost like postcards; oh, look at this! Now look at that! Okay, never mind, let’s go on back to the present.

That being said, the author’s mission is an ambitious one, and her word smithery is of high caliber. I look forward to seeing what else she publishes.

If you choose to read this book, I recommend using the printed word, whether digitally or as a physical copy.

I made it to about 50% and I was just sort of bored… I feel like nothing was really happening and I wasn’t that invested in either of the main characters or their relationship. I thought this would be a grittier portrayal of addiction and maybe I didn’t make it far enough but a 50% I had to call it quits.

Many thanks to NetGalley, Henry Holt & Company and Macmillan Audio for gifting me both a digital and audio ARC of this novel by Kelsey Ronan, gorgeously narrated by Janina Edwards. 4 stars!

Gus has overdosed in the bathroom of the restaurant where he works in Detroit. His sister bails him out again and takes him back to Flint. When he meets Monae, who wants to be an urban farmer, he can start to see a new life. Told over generations of this interracial couple, we see how both family and community meld to form our lives, and the troubles that exist when the city fails its people.

I began reading this book but quickly switched to the audiobook, where Janina Edwards' beautiful voice was the star. I really liked hearing about Gus and Monae's story but sometimes felt a bit lost in the switches to the past. It is a walk down memory lane with the music and culture of those times however. The Flint water crisis and how it affected those who live there was always in the background of this story. A good read but a better listen!

This is as much about the city of Flint as it is about Gus and Monae, an interracial couple who meet in 2014. Their story is the story of their parents and grandparents and this moves back and forth in time to tell it. The city, and their families, prosper as a result of the auto industry until it doesn't- and neither do they. Gus is trying to conquer his addiction and Monae dreams of being a farmer and their bond, formed on the farm, does indeed turn to romance but not in the way you might expect. The impending water crisis is always out there but in the mean time, there's other issues, tough ones, for these characters. So many ups and downs in this industrial city. I learned a great deal about Flint, which Ronan clearly loves. Thanks to Netgalley for the ARC. A good read.

As soon as I saw this book on Goodreads giveaway I was super excited to read it. For those of you not from the Flint, MI area Chevy in the Hole is a former site of a Chevrolet factory.

I really enjoyed this book. It was a great mix of historical fiction and contemporary literature.

As someone who was always lived in the Flint area and comes from a GM family I really appreciated the history of Flint and GM throughout the book. And I loved how the history of Flint wove into the present story of Monae and August.

Thanks Kelsey for highlighting some of the issues that plague Flint. Hopefully this reaches people in a way a news article can’t!

I was given an opportunity to read this book by Goodreads, Netgalley, and Henry Holt & Company in exchange for an honest review

This book is described as "a gorgeous, unflinching love letter to Flint, Michigan, and the resilience of its people, Kelsey Ronan's Chevy in the Hole follows multiple generations of two families making their homes there, with a stunning contemporary love story at its center."

Sadly, this story fell flat for me. I kept waiting to become hooked, but stayed at the same level of indifference towards the plot/characters the whole time.

There were a couple characters that I really did like and that definitely helped! I don't see myself recommending this one, unfortunately.

Thank you so much to MacMillan Audio for the advanced listening copy of this audiobook in exchange for an honest review. This is out on March 15th!

Chevy in the Hole encompasses decades of a region rich in history and overwhelmed by conflict, enviromental disaster, and tragedy. With multiple perspectives and time shifts, the author tries to bring the lineage of two families to life.

Between the time shifts and the perspectives, it was hard to keep everything straight. The author wanted to write a love letter to Flint, but really did not give anything but a bleak view into the history of the beleaguered city. The story was predominantly about the troubled August “Gus” Molloy, an addict trying to make something of his life. Monae, the young woman who became an important part of his life, factored into the story as well. As the author delved deep into both of their histories, going back many years into the time of Motown and worker strikes, the novel got so convoluted that it lost focus. I found it hard to forge a connection with any of the characters and stuggled to finish the novel, despite it being less than 300 pages. With such a rich history from which to draw, the author did not do justice to the region. For these reasons, I would be hesitant to recommend Chevy in the Hole to other readers.

Disclaimer: I was given an Advanced Reader's Copy of Chevy in the Hole by NetGalley and the publisher, Henry Holt and Co. The decision to read and review this book was entirely my own.

This one took me a while to really dive into. Once I found my groove, I loved the characters and were rooting for them. I truly felt like I was living in their world.

The tone of Ronan's novel, set in the vicinity of Flint, Michigan, is dark. The novel follows two families who struggle and eventually intertwine. The characters are somewhat hard to follow at first because of this. Nevertheless, this is a good read and certainly timely.

I can’t decide how I feel about this book, and so I have let the review go for far too long. If I had written this immediately after finishing the book, I may have given it a solid 3 stars, but now that a couple of weeks have gone by, I am not sure I’d even give it those 3. I am having trouble remembering much about the story except some quirky details - a recovering addict buys a house near a river, strikes at an auto plant, a character steals the horse head costume her father wore years ago from the basement of the museum where she works - these are the things that stayed with me, along with the frustration of
how often and sudden the shifts of time and place occur in the storyline. It was difficult to stay engaged with the story, or to get a real sense of the characters because it all felt so disjointed and haphazard. This one was simply not for me.