I received an e-ARC from NetGalley and bought a copy of The Cliffs by J. Courtney Sullivan. It sat on my TBR for the past couple of months but I finally picked it up. Now I’m asking myself. “Why did it take so long?”

This book is incredible. But it won’t be for everyone. It’s a slow burn book. It’s a story to be savored, page by page. It’s historical, feminist, contemporary. It’s about family and friends. It’s about love and loss. It’s about redemption. It’s about America’s messy history. It’s all this and so much more.

Jane has returned to her hometown in Maine after wrecking her marriage and career. As she struggles with her present problems, she returns to the site of her best memories-an old, purple, Victorian house on the cliffs. The house’s new owner, Genevieve, is also struggling with her problems, and the ghosts of the past.

J. Courtney Sullivan is a master storyteller. She weaves these women’s stories, as well as other women in the books stories, in such a way that requires a deft hand. The reader is captured for moments in time as these stories unfold. Then she takes you back to the basic story at hand. I was amazed and enraptured.

I’m just in awe of writers who can craft a story this well. I learned so much throughout the book and now I want to the-visit one of my favorite states.

Thank you to #netgalley, #knopf and @jcourtsullivan for this beautiful book. I received a complimentary e-copy of this book in exchange for an honest review. I’m glad I also bought a copy, I may need to re-read it in the future.

The Cliffs was the history lesson I have been craving.

At first, I didn’t know where this story was going to go. There was a lot of back and forth, but my friend encouraged me to stick with it. And I am so glad I did, because I am gutted and so sad.

I can’t say that “enjoy” is the right word for what I feel learning about the true indigenous history in America. Because that seems too optimistic? But I like unlearning what the American school system has taught us, and relearning true indigenous history, in all its horror.

I have read everything J Courtney Sullivan has written since I was a teenager, but The Cliffs surprised me. And it will surprise you, too. It is far from the contemporary fiction she is known for, but it shares her awareness that she has displayed in her previous works. This book was straight up humbling. I craved more and more, wanted to uncover the gritty and heartbreaking history like an Archaeologist. I wanted to dig until my fingers were raw and bleeding. This is the history we need to be learning.

Set on the cliffs of Maine, Jane discovers a large victorian house that has been abandoned for years. As a teenager she uses the house as a refuge. Twenty years later, now a Harvard archivist, she returns home to Maine following a terrible mistake that threatens both her career and her marriage. Jane is horrified to find the Victorian is now barely recognizable. The new owner, Genevieve, a summer person from Beacon Hill, has gutted it, transforming the house into a glossy white monstrosity straight out of a shelter magazine. Both Genevieve and Jane are wondering if the house is haunted or being used for illegal activities. A good read from Ms. Sullivan.

I enjoy reading books that center around an area and its real historical events. This book delivered on both counts. Although set in a fictional town, it came forth as a town that would exist in Maine. It dealt with Indigenous people from centuries ago and their history in the Maine area. We traveled back to the mid 1800s and the peoples in Maine at that time, both colonists, Indigenous community, and the Shaker community. I actually kept a list of events, places, and people mentioned in the book so I could learn more about them. I enjoyed the book and will look forward to J. Courtney Sullivan's next novel!
Thank you, Net Galley, for this downloaded book!

I received a free eARC from NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.

I say this every time, but…I can’t seem to quit you, J. Courtney Sullivan! Off the top of my head, I’m not sure there’s one of her books that I have legitimately loved, and yet whenever she has a new book out, I can’t stop myself from reading it. I’ve always felt that she tends to go off on unnecessary soapbox tangents, using her characters as mouthpieces for whatever issue is currently a Big Deal in the real world. It’s especially egregious here, and it unfortunately smacks of a smug, educated white woman trying to teach people about First Nations cultures. Don’t get me wrong - it’s a problem and it’s worthy of being talked about. But the execution is just SO clunky. There are literally pages and pages of Jane walking through an exhibit, learning about the indigenous people who used to occupy Maine. This has nothing whatsoever to do with the main plot of the story - there is at best an extremely tenuous connection to the idea of disturbing native artifacts (it’s bad to steal people’s actual skulls and put them on display) and Genevieve’s digging up the (extremely white) Littleton family’s graves to build her swimming pool. Which, yes, they’re both icky, but in VERY different ways, and the need to shoehorn this particular issue into the story also feels…well, icky.

Since this is an ARC, this could be different in the published version, but the execution also feels very piecemeal. We get these LONG chapters from characters other than Jane that end up just feeling like exposition (and Eliza, your story is both interesting and tragic, but why are you here? You deserve better). I wish they had been woven in more organically, and maybe in the final version they are. Our main character is ostensibly Jane, an academic and an alcoholic who has recently ruined both her marriage and career in one fatal evening. With nowhere else to go, and a house that needs to be cleaned out and sold since her mother’s death a few months earlier, Jane returns to her hometown of Awadapquit, Maine. She’s sort of at loose ends, waiting to hear whether or not she’ll actually be fired (she’s currently on unpaid leave), and white knuckling through sobriety. Jane’s hard to like. As I mentioned, she’s smug, like a college sophomore who has just taken a women’s studies course and is now SO much more enlightened than all of the poor plebeians around her. Except she’s a grown ass adult, and she still hasn’t outgrown it (but she works at Harvard, so she’s better and smarter than everyone else, obviously).

Anyway, when Jane was in high school, there was this house up on the cliffs that she was always obsessed with. It was a beautiful Victorian home that was seemingly abandoned. As long as Jane can remember, no one has lived there. But when she returns on her shame tour, a new family has finally bought the house and they’re…making some changes. Like any good history snob, Jane is thoroughly horrified that Genevieve has gutted the inside of the house and turned it into a symphony of beige nothingness. Genevieve is convinced she’s being haunted. Her son is seeing ghosts - I forget if he actually *says* the ghost is named Eliza or if Genevieve finds Eliza’s gravestone and jumps to that conclusion herself. Either way, she’d like Eliza to head towards the light, please. Jane gets draw into this mess because (deep breath) her best friend booked her an appointment with a medium so Jane could hopefully clear up some lingering issues with her dead mother, but the medium brought her a message from someone named “D” who wants her OWN mother not to worry about her, that she’s “not at Lake Grove anymore.” See, at one point during its tenure, the house was a boarding house called Lake Grove (which is a weird choice given that it’s…on the ocean). Jane is convinced that D must be the ghost haunting Genevieve.

As several other reviewers have pointed out, there’s just too much going on here. To say nothing of the plot-stalling lectures, there are too many viewpoints, and too many plot points, and it feels like you’re reading a few different stories clumsily tied together. Which, looking back at old reviews of some of Sullivan’s previous books, has frequently been an issue (The Engagements in particular comes to mind - there was a LOT going on in that book and only some of it was good). There’s Jane dealing with her past (and present). There’s Genevieve and the house situation in the present, plus all of the various dramas of the house’s former owners. And all throughout, it’s like Sullivan needs to prove how much research she’s done, because there are just pages and pages of exposition that ultimately add very little to the narrative. I was doing some serious skimming for the last 40% or so, because while I was invested enough in Jane’s story to want to finish, I was also SO bored with the nonstop history lectures.

The Cliffs had a lot going on in its dual timelines. I was entertained, but also somehow both over- and under-whelmed. An okay way to pass the time, if not a terribly memorable read.

Thank you J. Courtney Sullivan, Knopf, and NetGalley for providing this ARC for review consideration. All opinions expressed are my own.

The Cliffs tells the story of Jane, an archivist at a museum focusing on the untold history of women. Jane travels to her childhood home in Maine, leaving behind her husband as she grapples with what she needs and wants out of life. She is hired by a transplant from the city to research the history of a historic home and encounters more than just history in her research.

Overall, I enjoyed this novel and how history and the present were seamlessly woven together. The more I learned about museums and the repatriation of items that belong to native people, the more I wanted to research on my own and visit a museum. The author did an excellent job of taking an important subject and ensuring the reader recognized the importance of it, as well as the sensitive areas that come with it. J. Courtney Sullivan is an automatic-buy author for me, and I am already looking forward to what comes next!

The Cliffs is set in Maine and centers on a house on a cliff, and the history of the people that have inhabited the land throughout the years. I loved learning about the area, the indigenous people who initially settled in the area and the different generations who lived on the land. I was much less interested in the main character, Jane, and her current situation and found myself skimming those sections. The present day ending wrapped things up a bit too neatly but I really enjoyed the historical aspects. 3.75 stars

I really enjoy Courtney Sullivan's stories so, I have to compare this one to her other books. This one is my least favorite. I'm not into the supernatural, and when the story mentioned ghosts, meduims, and marbles, it kind of lost me. I will say that the story about the friendship between childhood girlfriends, the descriptions and history of Maine, and the devastating effects alcoholism can have on families was all intriguing and well done. The ghost stuff and the marbles was really never resolved. The audibook was well narrated.

3.25 out of 5. I liked it but it might have been too much at the same time. We have so many stories and themes and characters that I feel it gets bogged down. We have the history of the shakers/ native Americans/ women’s rights whilst also dealing with topics of alcoholism and addiction. It ties in beautifully at the end but it’s a lot to pack into a fiction book. I did appreciate the historical aspects of it but also it felt very preachy at times. It did led me to research about epigenics. I also had a hard time dealing with an alcoholic FMC - like I wanted to shout at her so much but then that probably means it was very well written as that’s what relatives of alcoholics feel like all the time. The description of the area and the land is gorgeous.

Review to follow. I'm reading, reading, reading, but not through yet. I wanted to make sure I got my rating in on time.
After completing the book, I dropped my rating to three stars.
This was not the book for me. It started out great. Set in Maine, high schooler Jane discovers an old abandoned mansion, probably built by a seafaring captain. Leaving Maine to attend college and with a job as an archivist in Boston, she returns many years later, her professional life as well as her personal life in shambles. As she is trying to get her late mother's house ready for sale, she is approached by the current owner of the mansion. It has been remodeled in such a way that nothing original is left. The current owner knows the house has ghosts and wants Jane to research the history. What Jane finds out about the house and about her community has the potential to change a lot of things for a lot of people.

There is a great deal of history about the Indigenous people, about the Shakers and other mystic groups. Several women have been involved in the ownership of the house over the years and some of their stories are not pretty. Jane puts her archival skills to work to find answers.

The story, for me, seemed to drag and at times it became very much the lecture platform. This, combined with the terrible decisions Jane was making, served to make it a slog to get through.

This was one of those books that I almost didn't want to read on my Kindle. Feels like a must to have a physical copy!

Regardless, I became completely enthralled in this story! The first half moved a bit slow for me, but around the halfway mark, I literally couldn't put it down. I loved how the author weaved in different perspectives and cultural history, which gave the novel so much more depth. I would highly recommend this book to friends and family (in physical form, of course!).

Thank you to NetGalley and Penguin Random House for sharing an advanced copy in exchange for my honest review.

A study into the frailty of human nature and inherited trauma wrapped in an engaging historical mystery. The author weaves together the compelling stories of women across decades - all of whom are connected to a singular house in coastal Maine. The through line is Jane, historian, researcher and alcoholic who returns home after her professionals and personal life implodes to tackle the remnants of her recently deceased mother’s estate. Compelling characters, fascinating history, and great storytelling!

I raced through this story about an old Victorian house that sits atop a cliff in coastal Maine. At first glance, The Cliffs seemed similar to Daniel Mason’s “North Woods”, but of course great authors will come up with unique stories that don’t tread in the same plot points. Jane Flanagan was an archivist at Harvard before her life came crashing down. She grew up in Awadapquit, Maine (a fictional town), and now has to clean out her deceased mother’s home before selling it. Meanwhile she is hired by a wealthy woman to research the history of an old house on the cliffs: the same house (abandoned at the time) Jane used to explore when she was a teenager. From there, we get a grand mosaic of the people who have lived in that house, as well as a soliloquy on the native peoples who inhabited the land before it was settled by the British. This book is equal parts a character story about Jane and a historical interrogation of the land that was colonized. I was deeply moved by the revelations in the book (including an excellent chapter on the Shakers) but I really wanted to know how Jane would face all her personal challenges. I have seen some criticize Jane’s academic speak about Native American history as off putting or as a lecture. It didn’t hit me that way. It’s more about how uncomfortable American history can be and how difficult it can be to talk about it. The stories, in the end, speak for themselves.

Thank you to the publisher for the gifted copy.

I learned a lot reading this novel. I learned about the indigenous people of Maine and their history, especially how they were exploited and abused. I learned about Shakers and the history of their founding by a woman who was killed for her beliefs. I learned about the history of Spiritualism and the present day camps where communication with dead loved ones, past life exploration, etc. has become a way of life for many and a lucrative business for some. I learned about historical grave robbing and how the sale and exhibition of items taken from graves continues today. Most of the present day story was about generational alcoholism and the trauma of divorce. If this sound like a lot of subjects for one novel, you're right, it is. The Cliffs refers to a cliff jutting out from the Maine coast. The people, historical and present day, are connected in some way to that same piece of land. Even the ghosts. Yes. There are also ghosts.

This book had a lot of everything and while at times I felt it was maybe a little too much and too all.over the place ultimately I liked it. I really liked the little bits of history that I knew next to nothing about prior to this such as the shakers. I like historys mysteries and ghost stories both of which were well done. I also really enjoyed how the reader got to know the full story of each of the ghosts but Jane didn't really.

J. Courtney Sullivan's books are either a hit or miss for me. This one was unfortunately a miss. I really enjoyed the Jane story line and the flashbacks to the old, original owners of the house. The Native American story lines and information were important and interesting but I felt no connection to it. It was almost like Sullivan decided to give a history lesson periodically throughout the story. The Native American chapters could honestly be a completely different book. Because of this I felt like the conclusion of Jane's story line was rushed and therefore a bit of a let down. I see what the author was trying to do with the book, it just didn't work for me.
Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for an advance copy of this book. All words and opinions are my own.

I had high hopes for this novel but I ultimately did not connect with the story. Thank you for the opportunity to read it.

I really wanted to enjoy this book because I heard so many great things, but it took me a bit to get into it and I found the characters a bit too unlikeable. I want to revisit this one and reread to see how my perception of the book changes

I received this book complimentary from NetGalley but all opinions are my own.

I requested this book because I usually love J Courtney Sullivan books. This one read a bit like a textbook at times and the plot was pretty meandering. I really struggled to get into it. I thought it was interesting but also just a lot of dry info that I didn’t get as sucked in as I usually do.