For something with such solid line writing, it seems wrong to only be giving this one two stars. At the same time, the line writing didn’t evoke strong feelings in me towards these characters. Maybe that means I need to rethink how I assess line writing. Over the course of reading this novella (144 pages), I kept getting so frustrated. I wanted to care about the characters as I do with every book I read, but I just did not. The third person narration may have been part of why I couldn’t connect. It didn’t work here. In terms of story, when something is so short I expect it to really pack a punch. I’m thinking in the vein of Claire Keegan who writes short novels/novellas but by the end I’m fully enraptured in the story and characters. I don’t want to keep laying into this book, so I think I’ll leave it at that. Just didn’t work for me.

Novella. I did not really enjoy this... The chapters were really long and time jumped all over the place constantly. Extremely repetitive. I honestly would have probably DNFd if it was not a novella that was only about 140 pages. It was overall well written but to me it was just boring, not my cup of tea.

The Most by Jessica Anthony is a tense, reflective, and fast-paced read. Kathleen and Virgil are a complicated couple who you immediately have a sense of in this single-sitting read. Anthony slowly reveals the tension and truth lying just below the surface of their seemingly perfect 50s life. After I finished the book, I also found myself returning in thought to Kathleen in the pool. For fans of the movie Challengers or the book Dept. of Speculation, I highly recommend this tense exploration of a marriage on the brink of collapse.

i'll be honest, this one really wasn't for me. i was expecting, based on the synopsis, a slow-burn suspense rather than a character study. i felt like the mention of laika was a heavy-handed metaphor for being trapped and unable to escape your fate, and while this is a story where i don't think we're supposed to like our characters, i felt absolutely no sympathy for their plight and therefore really didn't care what the outcome was. maybe others enjoyed this and the americana vibes but the aesthetics, as beautifully written as they were, were not enough to save this one for me.

A fascinating premise. Kathleen isn’t feeling well and decides to stay home while her husband and two sons go to church. When they return, they find Kathleen soaking in the pool, refusing to get out. During her time in the pool, Kathleen reflects on the dreams she gave up on and the state of her marriage. Recommended to anyone looking for a quick and entertaining relationship drama.

Thank you to Little, Brown and Company and NetGalley for the opportunity to read a copy.

If you’re looking for an excellent one-sitting read, look no further. The Most will pull you right in and not let you go. 1950s housewife drama at its finest. Take this one to the beach or on the plane and you won’t be disappointed.
Thank you #netgalley for the digital ARC!

📖📖 Book Review 📖📖 My absolutely favorite book growing up was King Bidgood’s in the Bathtub, a tale of a king who does not want to leave his bathtub and makes the whole court entertain him there. The Most is this book but for all of the mothers! I am a mom of four kids and it is exhausting. Any summer day that I have alone, I float in the pool and reflect on life staring up into the sky and it is a surreal, dissociatively enlightening experience. Kathleen is a mother and housewife in the 1950’s who decides to forgo Sunday at church to have her time of reflection in the pool of their apartment complex. While the book takes place in one day, the musings span across time through moments of her life. A beautifully poignant novel that will resonate with women and remind us that even decades after the 1950’s, we still have a strong universal connection as wives, mothers, daughters, and women. The Most is a remarkable unique and moving piece of literature.

Review is posted on Goodreads and the final review I’ll be posted on Instagram ahead of the publication date.

a short little book, jessica anthony's 'the most' opens with kathleen, a 1957 delaware housewife, getting into her building complex's pool on warm november morning, and refusing to get out. set over the course of 8 hours, we learn about kathleen, her failed tennis career, her relationship with her husband, and the infidelities committed on both sides of their marriage. this book is a consuming, addicting read, one that has the reader questioning where this relationship is hurtling, towards destruction or somewhere better?

Thank you NetGalley for a copy of The Most. This novella was a picture of a marriage that dug deep into their relationship. I wanted so much more character development as I read this book. The description on the back of the book was misleading and had I really known what this story would be about I likely would never have read the book.

This was a fun and quick read. This is my second time reading a story that takes place in the span of one day. Two partners must decide whether or not to confront their unraveling secrets and continue forward in their marriage. It’s also a story about what could have been. I enjoyed how the author slowly introduces readers to more details about the characters and we begin to understand why Kathleen will not get out of the pool. I also liked the switch between the characters’ perspectives. Thank you to the publisher and NetGalley for this arc.

Jessica Anthony’s The Most is a short story that gives off college literature class reading vibes. This time capsule of a novella opens up the world of November 1957, as well as a seemingly picturesque marriage, to the reader. However, as can be expected with any good story, nothing is quite as it seems.

Kathleen and Virgil are (almost) living the American Dream. He works in insurance, while she, a former collegiate tennis star, raises their two sons in New England. Virgil, who recently accepted a lesser-paying job in Delaware, has moved the family into an apartment complex filled with elderly residents who do not use the complex’s focal drawing point - a swimming pool.

Month after month, the pool sits unoccupied until an unseasonably warm fall day when Kathleen decides to go for a swim … and doesn’t get out. She sits in the pool from sun up to sun down, driving Virgil crazy as he tries to figure out what’s gone wrong with his wife this time. As Virgil leaves her to her aquatic mission, he takes off with his coworkers to play a round of golf, because how often do you get a 70 degree fall day in Delaware?

Meanwhile, both he and Kathleen ponder the state of their marriage, and some unseemly secrets start to come to the light.

The Most is a literary slice of life novella that shatters the illusion of the perfect 1950’s family. So often portrayed with gleaming smiles plastered across their faces, the quintessential nuclear family is brought into question in this short story. How quickly can stereotypes turn to myth with just a little insight into a person’s life? The Most is here to challenge the flawless facades we project outward, and encourage us to look in to people at the heart.

I didn't know what to expect with this story but I was immediately enthralled!

Yes, this is a story of Kathleen, a former college tennis champ, mother of two children living in an apartment complex with her husband. Instead of going to church this Sunday she decides to get in the pool and she will not come out!

But it is SO MUCH MORE. Somehow, Jessica Anthony seamlessly blends in the story of Kathleen, her husband Virgil, his father and all of their lives. It's fascinating and fast moving. It's a car wreck you can't look away from, it's a television show that you can't stop talking about...it's a work of art.

If you love literature, great stories and uncommon themes, the Most is a book for you!
#littlebrownandcompany #littlebrown #themost #jessicaanthony

Thank you to NetGalley and Little, Brown and Company for this ARC. All opinions are my own. I was drawn to this short, 98 page novella by author Jessica Anthony based on the cover and synopsis. I liked the initial POV of both husband and wife. The novella focuses on a day in the life of The Becketts, a married for nine years couple who met at The University of Delaware in the 1940’s. Virgil is a pretty insurance salesman at Equitable in Wilmington, Delaware, and Kathleen is a former college tennis ace now Newark, Delaware housewife. The couple and their two sons have relocated from Rhode Island back to an apartment complex in Delaware where they went to college. The Most is set on an unseasonably warm Sunday in November 1957 at the same time the Sputnik and its canine passenger, Laika, are orbiting earth. On this particular Sunday, Kathleen decides she is not feeling up to joining her husband, Virgil, or their two young boys, at church per their weekly ritual. Instead, Kathleen sends the three of them off to their church fifteen miles away and gets into her old bathing suit to swim in the unused complex swimming pool. Readers soon learn both husband and wife are keeping secrets that could wreck their marriage. Virgil returns home from church with their boys, anxious to take advantage of the unseasonably warm Delaware weather and hit the Country Club’s golf course with his male co-workers, only to find Kathleen still in the swimming pool, refusing to get out. Virgil is anxious to meet the men at the golf course on time, so he does his best to coax her out. Kathy mentions to him she is fine, and brings up the fact that people are calling the orbiting Soviet dog “Muttnik,” and her disgust the dog may die up there, so Virgil thinks this is why she is refusing to get out of the pool. Virgil sets off to make his tee time at the Country Club six miles away, undeterred by Kathy's uncharacteristic behavior. The more we learn about these characters, the more we see this marriage in not idealistic. It is quite depressing to see how unfulfilled these partners are when you crack the veneers of their seemingly happy life. When Virgil returns from golfing, Kathy is still in the pool, and their thoughts are revealed (although not to each other) The Most wraps up remarkably quickly with Kathy still in the pool and no closure. I wish the ending wrapped up more neatly, as it left a lot to be desired in my opinion.

A story of domestic unhappiness being slowly uncovered , of buried secrets between a married couple coming to light, of an unfulfilled wife finally reaching a breaking point. Very short, takes place over the course of one day, hits all the right emotional tones and keeps up the tension throughout . Reminded me of Rachel Ingalls . Delightful

Thanks to NetGalley and the publisher for the chance to read this book!
Anthony's crafting of the novella packs a lot of history and nuance into the marriage at the center of the story--we really feel immersed in the historical context both regarding current events and women's "roles". In terms of tension, the premise is excellent but falls a little flat as the book goes on. Unfortunately, repetition in several spots is distracting from the otherwise solid pace. That said, the author does a great job with a realistic portrayal of marriage and its give-and-take. Readers will fall on different sides of realism versus dramatic tension, I think, and while I did enjoy this peek into a troubled marriage, I needed Kathleen or Virgil to take a directive step at the end.

Completed in the span of one day, set in the 1950s, this book documents the history behind our protagonist, Kathleen, and the slowly escalating reasons for her uncharacteristic entry into her family’s apartment complex pool, and for her refusal to come out. A quickly unraveled yet juicily complex backstory of a fizzling marriage, the conceiving of two sons, and a peek into the life of a woman tired of being full of secret resentments, The Most might not do the most, but it is an addicting read that provides interesting character developments and dynamics, interestingly set precisely in the time of the take off of Sputnik 2.

This was a short little nugget of a book but DANG was it packed with emotions.

I hate to compare books (false- I love comparing books) but this one reminded me so much of the short story “evidence of the affair” by TJR which I LOVED!

And I really loved this one too.

One warm November Delaware day, Kathleen gets into the pool at the apartment complex and doesn’t get out for the entire day. That doesn’t sound like much of a story ooooo but it is!


Kathleen’s 1950s housewife story is so far away from life now that it seems almost unimaginable. However, I felt deeply moved by her story and found commonalities with her.

I will think about this book for a while…

Thank you to NetGalley and Little, Brown and Company for this ARC. All opinions are my own.

The Most tells the story of the Beckett family in '50s Newark, Delaware. The matriarch and patriarch of the family, Kathleen and Virgil Beckett each have their own secrets to keep from one another and each has a different perspective on past memories. One November Sunday, the weather is nice, Virgil and their two sons head to church, and Kathleen stays behind. She decides to take a dip in the apartment complex's pool, and she won't get out.

This was a short book, but it was full of stories and sordid secrets that I was entertained by. I'm not sure I would read it again, but I am happy I did, nonetheless. Kathleen's character was very intriguing, and I've never read a character I felt a bit indifferent about—good thing, bad thing, I don't know. I liked the '50s setting, with its references to music and historical events happening around the time (Little Rock & Sputnik 2). It wasn't too showy or too in-your-face. I liked how the author was graceful in her writing and didn't write full love scenes; they still felt fleshed out. I thought it was going to be a spooky psychological thriller, but I was mistaken. Whoops!

Would recommend to someone who likes a period piece and a quick read about marriage (lol).

This novella captures the stifling atmosphere of mid-century life that is often a staple in novels about this period and which I love to read about. It is sparse and beautifully written, and the structure of alternating perspectives in each chapter lends itself well to the narrative. It reminded me a lot of Revolutionary Road. Bonus points for keeping it short — the length is perfect and more effective than it would have been if it was a full-length novel.

This book was okay. Very short and a very interesting concept which I love to see. I just don’t think I truly felt anything good or bad towards the characters and it lacked some depth. I could see myself coming back to this at some point to see if I like it better in a couple months. If you like character driven stories and/or books about families and relationships you may like this