In my grief, I love reading about grief. The World After Alice was no different. Every grief journey is different, so I can never read too much on this topic. This was fresh and lovely and sad and made me appreciate those I still have with me.

“ She had known then that he was lying, the same dim way she’d known Nick had been lying about Caro all those years ago, but chosen not to pick the scab. It was better to live in a blissful world full of lies, she’d learned, than in one ravaged by truth.”

This character driven story explores the impact of suicide on a family. Alice took her life as an teen without leaving indications about the reasons. The family is left with their grief, which eventually tears them all apart. When they gather for an unexpected wedding, tensions are high and secrets are revealed. There are different POVs in this one, with one being Alice. I found this story to be engaging and the family drama to be messy and mostly relatable. I questioned some of the motives of the characters and was somewhat disgusted by one of the relationships, which I think was the point.

All in all this was a solid 4 star read for me. Thank you to NetGalley and Penguin Viking for the ARC to read and review.

Unfortunately, this wasn't for me. I usually like family drama-style stories with secrets, but I think given the sensitive content matter of this one, I just didn't really enjoy it that much. Additionally, I found the timeline a little confusing at times. I think others may really enjoy this, but I think the combination of not being in the right headspace for it combined with the writing style just made this not quite my cup of tea.

This is a sad, but very interesting and compelling, story about two families that are deeply affected by teenage Alice’s suicide. She is the musical genius daughter of Nick and Linnie; she is the sister of Benji; she is the student of Mr. N, her philosophy teacher; she is the best friend of Morgan, a fellow music aficionado; and Alice’s death has also affected Morgan’s father, Peter (mother, Sequoia, having long ago left the scene).

The story begins when Benji and Morgan decide to get married and invite both families to their wedding. They know the joining of the two families will cause much drama and tension, but do not want to get married without having their loved ones in attendance. And so the story begins….

The reader of this novel gets to experience the memories and sorrows of each character, some of them before Alice’s death, but many after. Her absence has made an extreme difference in all of their lives.

This is a sad story, but Green does an excellent job of telling it and making the characters feel so real. Though it is a sorrowful account, it doesn’t mean that there isn’t some happiness that comes out of it, which helped me to enjoy this debut novel by Lauren Aliza Green.

I’d like to thank NetGalley, Lauren Aliza Green, and Viking for the advanced reader's copy in exchange for my unbiased review.

(Thanks to @laurenalizagreen and @VikingBooks #gifted.) You all know I’m a fan of debut novels and if they’re more literary, I nearly swoon! 𝗧𝗛𝗘 𝗪𝗢𝗥𝗟𝗗 𝗔𝗙𝗧𝗘𝗥 𝗔𝗟𝗜𝗖𝗘 by Lauren Aliza Green is one such novel. The story centers on Alice, a girl who took her own life 12 years earlier at only 16. That’s the trauma all the characters in this book are living with as they come together for the wedding of Alice’s younger brother and her best friend. To many, the very idea of this wedding, long kept a secret, is shocking.⁣
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In the story we meet an array of people who were part of Alice’s life. Not only her parents, brother and best friend, but also some who might seem more peripheral, but who never-the-less had connections to Alice. The story alternates between past, the days around Alice’s death and her funeral, and present, the wedding weekend of Benji and Morgan. Throughout, chapters shift focus from one character to the next, offering insights into the reasons behind Alice’s decision and the delicately pieced together lives of those left behind.⁣⁣
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“They embraced clumsily, remembering only mid-embrace that they didn’t do this anymore - didn’t touch or treat each other with niceties or pretend the carcass of their marriage wasn’t smeared in each other’s blood.”⁣⁣
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This was a well done debut and a story I truly enjoyed. My heart felt for almost everyone involved. I do think the book had a small flaw, one often seen from debut authors. Green used an abundance of obscure words. I read a lot and have a decent vocabulary, but I needed to look up MANY words. Every time I had to do that, I was taken out of the story. That shouldn’t happen. It’s something the editor should have interceded with and advised against. Aside from that, I think 𝘛𝘩𝘦 𝘞𝘰𝘳𝘭𝘥 𝘈𝘧𝘵𝘦𝘳 𝘈𝘭𝘪𝘤𝘦 was a wonderful debut and I look forward to reading more from Green. ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️.25

Morgan and Benji surprise their family with a wedding invitation; they are getting married in Maine but no one really knew they were dating. It's 12 years since Alice, Benji's older sister and Morgan's best friend died and the families are still trying to get over the loss and figure out the why. All of the guests have secrets, agendas and interwoven relationships with each other. One can definitely see why the newlyweds kept the families apart for so long as the weekend is revealing so many issues that may have been better left untouched.

I ended up listening to this one for the majority of the novel; I got the audio based on feedback I had heard and I think it is the way to go. I loved the story and found that it flowed really well on audio; but also enjoyed the 30% that I read. While I was immediately engrossed in the story I also thought there may have been one too many convenient coincidences for plot; but I found this story of family trauma and grief after such a horrible loss to be compelling and engaging. In essence the novel is the sad after story of a family with two children growing up on the upper west side of NYC, that story is going to speak to me as I am raising two children in that neighborhood (but with happier results). I found this novel about how, 12 years later this family (and found family) was still dealing with grief a worthwhile read.

Thank you to NetGalley and Viking for the ARC to review

I received a free ARC ebook of <i>The World after Alice</i> from NetGalley in exchange for an unbiased review.

There is so much pain in this novel. Alice is the older child of Linnie and Nick, big sister to Benji, and best friend to Morgan. Beautiful, talented and smart, Alice is slowly retreating from what and who she knows. Video security footage shows her jumping into the river, never to be seen again.

Even though years have passed, everyone in Alice's orbit is still traumatized. Her parents' marriage disintegrated and all question how they missed the signs of Alice's pain. Guilt, mostly undeserved, is a primary emotion.

Much of this novel takes place during the wedding weekend of Benji and Morgan. They had kept their relationship a secret so others are surprised, perhaps dismayed, at their love.

This novel clearly reveals how a suicide can ripple through lives for years.

A debut novel, the book follows multiple viewpoints of family members for a weekend as they come together for the wedding of Benji and Morgan 12 years after Alice, Benji’s sister and Morgan’s best friend, took her own life. The story jumps between the present day, Alice’s funeral and the days leading up to her death; hitting on themes of grief, forgiveness and relationships. The author uses flowery and poetic language with extreme detail to convey the Maine cottage and New York City streets where the wedding and past events occur. This book is ideal for readers who enjoy a character-driven story where the third-person perspective allows the reader to gain a deeper insight into each character’s internal struggles. I thought the perspectives of Nick’s second wife and Linnie’s wedding date to be the most interesting as outsiders who’ve inserted themselves into the dramatic interworkings of a broken family both before and after the tragedy. However, the book felt slow with some details seeming irrelevant to the plot. I felt myself wanting more. The synopsis alludes to secrets so I was waiting for a big twist that never came.

THank you for an advance copy of this book. This was a pefect summer book, set in lovely coastal Maine with lots of family drama to get engrossed in. This character driven story of a couple starting over deals with topics like grief, divorce, loss and moving on in some well thought out ways. The pace was a little slow but I feel that also matched the overall tone of the book. I overall enjoyed this one, it was well written with real characters going thru real, relatable issues. 3.5 stars.

The World After Alice is a thought provoking novel about a teenager who dies by suicide, and the friends and family she leaves behind. Alice's best friend and brother are getting married. Their families gather at their wedding and this celebration is filled with interesting sub-plots. Alice's story is told in flashback and juxtaposed with the present day. The story is sad, but well written.

Teenage Alice commits suicide by walking off a bridge. The World After Alice depicts the reactions of her parents, friends, and family after her death as they continue searching for the why of her death. I loved the well developed characters that were perfectly imperfect and flawed humans. Their reactions seemed natural and real. I felt like this book had a real heartbeat to it and I enjoyed it immensely.

I am very drawn to family dramas and when I read the synopsis of this book I was immediately drawn to it. Unfortunately due to reasons I’ll discuss in a bit I was sorely disappointed.
12 years have passed since 16 year old Alice Weil ended her life by stepping off of a bridge and plunging into a river and her younger brother, Benji, has invited the entire family to Maine for his wedding to Morgan, Alice’s best friend. Alice’s death tore the family apart and this wedding is the first time they are all together since her memorial service. Tensions run high between his divorced parents, Nick and Linnie, and Morgan’s Dad, Peter. Thrown into the mix are Nick’s current wife, Caro, Linnie’s new boyfriend, Ezra, and Peter’s huge secret. Told in 5 parts between current day, the past, and the narratives of all of the characters, this dysfunctional family drama will leave you both stymied and sad.
This had the potential of being a great book, but instead it is the most pretentious book I’ve ever read. Lauren Aliza Green has tried too hard and instead of drawing readers in, she pushes us away by using vocabulary that you’d only see on the SAT and sentences that are structured so ridiculously they had me audibly groaning.
It’s very hard to enjoy a book when the author is clearly looking down to her readers and that’s exactly how this felt. I love words and vocabulary but when “fancy” words are over used they turn the book into a clunky a mess instead of making it a showstopper.
I think Ms. Green could be a great author but she has to remember who her audience is. Thank you to NetGalley and Penguin Group Viking for an advanced copy of this. The World After Alice hit the shelves on July 2nd.

I'm not going to mince words. The World After Alice, by Lauren Aliza Green, was a huge disappointment. It tells the sad story of the aftermath of a talented sixteen-year-old girl's suicide. With one exception, none of the characters were engaging or insightful, despite their grief. The prose managed to be both clunky and pretentious. The POV changed frequently as did the timeline which moved from before the suicide to the period immediately following it to a period twelve years later. While all three time periods were significant, the moves back and forward never seemed connected. I tend to be a perverse reader; I generally start a book and stay with it until the last page. I never felt committed to the story or characters and found myself easily distracted from reading. While I cannot recommend this novel, others liked it and I encourage readers to check out other reviews. As always, I am grateful to NetGalley, Penguin Random House Books for the opportunity to read a digital ARC. It is always a privilege.

Lately I’ve been in the mood for family dramas and it sounded like this one would fit the bill. Unfortunately the execution didn’t work for me and I decided to DNF. Thank you to the publisher and Netgalley for the free ebook to review.

A girl jumps to her death. Years later, her younger brother and best friend’s paths cross again, fall in love, and decide to get married. The wedding leads to old wounds reopened and relationships examined as the aftershocks of the loss of Alice linger over a decade later.

Character driven with sophisticated prose, I found myself pulled into aspects of the story, while others drug slightly. At times it was a little too wordy, I looked up several definitions while reading which didn’t help the pacing.

I really wanted more from Benji and Morgan as well. They really should have been the center of the novel but often slipped into the background.

A strong novel to be read with care for anyone affected by suicide.

Thank you to NetGalley and Viking Books.

Usually, I enjoy books about family dynamics, but The World After Alice felt dry and brittle. I could not get interested in the book no matter how many times I opened it and started to read. I just gave up after a few chapters. I thank the author, publisher, and NetGalley for the complimentary copy of this ebook. The opinions expressed in this review are entirely my own.

This story to me was an atmospheric reflection on the lives around Alice, her brother, mother, father and school friend, Morgan. Morgan is marrying Alice’s brother, Benji and their relationship leading up to their wedding is complicated by the knowledge that this life changing event will be the first major one without Alice. Alice’s mother, Linnie, left her father, Nick and is in a relationship with Alice’s teacher. Nick married his amour and secretary whom he cheated on Linnie with and they now have a child of their own. The lives are intertwined in their grief and reflecting on what happened in the days leading up to Alice’s apparent suicide. It’s a methodical layering of the stories and I enjoyed it despite its somewhat bleak context.

Alice was a promising violinist when she disappeared. Video coverage shows her putting down her violin and jumping off a bridge with her body never being found. Flash forward 20 years later and Alice's brother, Benji, and her best friend, Morgan, are planning their wedding. The catch is no one in either of their families knew they were even dating.

The author writes like it was a mystery and I had to make the connections and follow the clues to who belonged to who. Was Peter just some guy Nick owed money? Was he Morgan's father? Linnie's boyfriend? I spent a lot of brain power trying to figure out those connections rather than getting to know the character. What I did feel was other than Benji they were all horrible people.

The narrative jumps around to a time when Alice was in high school before she disappeared, what happened right after and then all the wedding activities. It wasn't hard to figure out what time you were reading but it seemed scattered and chaotic.

The author also tends to use a lot of words to show off her vocabulary by using obscure words. I had to look up a new word every couple of pages which also detracted from the narrative. But now I know what salmagundi and brume mean.

I think that the author has potential and I would be interested in reading more of her work.

Thank you to Netgalley and Penguin Group Viking for providing me with a digital copy.

This is some next level family drama.

Twelve years ago, teenaged Alice killed herself. Her parents' marriage--weakened already by her father's infidelity--couldn't bear the strain. Alice's brother, Benji, fled to boarding school and college to get away from his mother, Linnie, and father, Nick, with his new family. Years later, a chance encounter reunites him with Morgan, Alice's best friend, and they become involved. Secretly, because they know the effect it will have on their families.

It turns out keeping their relationship a secret until they announced their upcoming wedding didn't make the whole situation any easier. So this whole family descends upon a Maine resort for the wedding that everyone thinks is a bad idea, except for the bride and groom. Told from multiple points of view with different timelines, the novel, despite its unusual and rather convoluted plot, manages to be by turns luminous, hopeful, and heartbreaking. #TheWorldAfterAlice #NetGalley

This was a cute fiction book following the lives of those around her after the suicide of a young woman named Alice. Her brother, her mother, her father, and others.

This reads as a coming of age book looking at how grief shapes the lives of those effected while also looking at the dysfunctional parts of the family. Slow build up and a satisfying ending.