This book is lovely and it wrecked me in the end. I fell asleep last night with swollen eyes and a tear stained face. I have enjoyed most of the Jennifer E. Smith books I have read and was so excited to see a new one coming out. This did not disappoint and I if you are a Jennifer E. Smith fan you should definitely add it to your TBR list. Siblings who mean a lot to each other, making up after a long time disagreement, a bit of romance, good relationships with nieces/nephews, heartbreaking parental relationships, and sickness are all part of this story. Thank you NetGalley and the publisher for an ARC of this book. Can't wait until April 2025 when this one comes out.

After years apart, the four Endicott siblings embark on an reunion in North Dakota when called upon by their youngest sibling, Jude. Fun for the Whole Family is a moving story about family and the ties that connect you despite distance, time, and all sorts of other messy life adventures. As the reunion begins, you soon realize that each sibling is dealing with their own struggle, and underlying is the event that left all them all disconnected from each other for the past few years. I found the storytelling compelling, and I enjoyed watching each character develop. I fell in love with Jennifer E Smith's writing when I read The Unsinkable Great James, and was thrilled to receive the ARC of her newest book. I would highly recommend this book to other readers that enjoy family sagas and love a book with flawed characters, just like the rest of us! Thank you to NetGalley and Random House Publishing Group/Ballantine Books, all opinions are my own.

What an unexpected wow of a read!
Really affecting.
Such depth of character and story.
Wished the title to either have been "No Endicott Left Behind" or "The Extraordinary Endicotts" to better represent the book and its themes.

With thanks to NetGalley and Random House Publishing/Ballantine for this e-ARC!

If you like complicated sibling relationships, Fun for The Whole Family is for you.

4 siblings, an absent mother, lots of road trips, family secrets.

A mom, who picked a hopeless dream over her own children. A dad who was there in person but didn't care for parenting the said children.

Now the children are all adults. Connor is a award winning author, who told his own less than ideal childhood story and won literary recognition thanks to it but caused a rift between himself and his siblings because he never asked for permission to tell "their" story. Roddy is a celebrated soccer player, at the end of his career, trying to hang on to it a little longer at the expense of his relationship with his partner Winston. Jude is a famous Hollywood actress with her own secrets. And lastly, the eldest, Gemma, the ordinary one, with an ordinary job, trying to have a baby but not so sure if she wants to be a mother due to her own past.

After not seeing each other for 3 years and no communication except for occasional polite text exchanges, the siblings get together after an out-of-the-blue invitation from Jude. The reunion in a cabin in Montana turns into a locked-room drama when they get snowed in. They have nothing else to do but to talk and hash out the past, get everything left unsaid off their chests. Emotions run high. There are uncomfortable conversations, some tears and lots of love and healing in this story. The POV changes pretty often with short breaks of stories from their road trips. Smith creates 4 complicated characters. You get to hear each siblings side of the story, what their past means to them, how their circumstances affected them as a person.

Gemma is the woman after my own heart. Smith played with the oldest daughter dynamic so well. I saw so much of myself in her.

This book had me at North Dakota. I really enjoyed the story, the characters, and how it all came together. Thank you for the opportunity to read it early!

Fun for the Whole Family is the story of a family reunion, set in a snow storm in North Dakota. Jude has orchestrated the weekend and has successfully convinced her estranged siblings to meet her there so she can divulge some old and new secrets. We learn as the book progresses about their mom, Frankie, and about the history of Frankie's driving them through as many states as possible with the mission of ultimately driving through all fifty. As the story progresses, we learn that each of the siblings is currently experiencing suffering in their own unique way.

My first impression of this book was the cover, which suggests a fun and humor-filled story. So, I was surprised that the book was more about sadness and family drama. There are a lot of family reunion stories out there that are a little similar to this one, in which adult family members share difficult past memories and come to terms with their current lives in light of those past events. This book was enjoyable to read and I found the ending to be satisfying.

Thanks to NetGalley for allowing me to read and review Fun for the Whole Family.

I love some family drama and this novel delivered. Four adult siblings reconnect and I felt all the emotions reading their stories. You knew you were waiting for secrets to be revealed and I was anxious to see what came next. Would definitely recommend to those who love reading about complicated family dynamics.

Thanks to NetGalley and the publisher for the ARC.

Sibling relationships seem to be having their moment in literary fiction at the moment - with Blue Sisters, Intermezzo, and now Fun for the Whole Family joining the roster. I think readers who enjoyed those books, as well as Taylor Jenkin Reid's Malibu Rising would have fun reading this as well.

This is a book about a somewhat extraordinary family who reunite for a weekend, after a falling out that took place some years ago. Extraordinary in that they were raised in an unconventional way, travelled most states in the US, and went on to become highly succesful and famous - an author, a soccer player, an oscar nominee, and a marketing analyst.
I like who the book keeps switching timelines, from the past to the present, and the way we get to see perspectives of each of the characters.

However, I think my experience differs from a lot of other readers in that I did not find myself emotionally swept away by this book. I had a hard time connecting with the characters, and seeing them as people rather than fictional entities. They felt flat, and I although so much was said, I still felt like many relationships were not fleshed out well enough. It felt like we got close to some of the tensions between child and parent, and one sibling to the other, but in a way that felt more "tell" than "show". Resolutions when they did happen felt fast and abrupt, without much depth or conversation. The secrets felt predictable, so there wasn't much in the story to really keep me going.

Heather Dixon wrote a great bench read. We have the three sisters, Alex, Sam and Jess. They return home when their mom calls Jess and tells her that Dad had passed away. The sisters are lost without him and return home to be with mom. Alex is looking for some items in the shed when she comes upon a bundle of letters. She is wondering who the letters were from so she starts reading and discover they are love letters unsigned to their Dad. Thus begins the summer of lies and secrets. Can the sisters survive the summer and remain true to each other and themselves. Read this story and find the answers.

The tale of the four Endicott siblings was one that I adored. A fun family story with excellent character development and a good tempo. Although I didn't feel like I had a complete picture of Connor or whether he overcame writer's block at the end, I still adored all of their relationship problems and their intense love for one another, even when they had to part ways. Typical family problems, despite the unbreakable bonds between family members. Overall, it was a fun read, though I thought the ending came a little too quickly.

Fun for the Whole Family is a story about the Endicott siblings and their unorthodox childhood that included many road trips with their mother while they were growing up. They were always traveling somewhere new and looking to check all of the US states off their list. We meet with siblings when they are adults and are all semi-estranged and keeping secrets from each other. It's a book that will break your heart and give you hope all at the same time. This would be such a great film adaptation.
Thanks to Netgalley for a free copy in exchange for an awesome review.

This wasn’t for me, unfortunately. I couldn’t grasp the story based off the writing style. Thank you netgalley and the publisher for gifting me this arc.

I loved The Unsinkable Greta James so was very excited to read this. I had a few false starts where I read a few pages and lost interest but once I got going I couldn't put it down.

It's a simultaneously heartbreaking and heartwarming story about four siblings and the meaning of family and forgiveness. It was an absolutely beautiful read.

I loved this story of the four Endicott siblings. Great character development and a great pace for a fun family story. I feel like I didn't get a proper wrap up of Connor and whether he broke through his writer's block at the end, but I loved all their relationship woes and the love they strongly shared with one another, even when they found themselves reluctantly apart. Typical family woes though the family ties bind beyond reason. I felt like it ended a bit abruptly, but all in all an entertaining read. 4 stars.

Netgalley, please do something with your app to allow for font adjustment. The font on both my iPad and iPhone were just so small it made for painful reading.

A complicated family story told with dual timelines and a multifaceted group of characters that makes for a very compelling story. Thanks to the publisher and netgalley for this copy for read and review

It was a good family drama and was well crafted and readable. Overall an ok book
Thanks to Netgalley and the publisher for letting me review book

What an absolutely wonderful story of family - the complexity, the love, the memories, and the endurance. This was a heaping helping of feels with so many layers as four adult siblings came back together. Each character was so unique in their path, but they also all "fit" together so well. I loved that this was blend of the present and the stories from the past - including learning the truth behind some of those past experiences. The character depth and way they were each written around the realities of family was just so, so, good. Thanks to NetGalley for the early look at this April 2025 release!

I adored the novel “The Unsinkable Greta James,” so I was excited for chance to read and review “Fun for the Whole Family” by Jennifer E. Smith. As it rarely happens with a second novel, I love this story almost more than the author’s previous work.

I love novels that focus on family and this book is a great example of that. The four estranged siblings are brought back together by an abrupt text one of them sends. For almost three years, the siblings—Gemma, Connor, Roddy and Jude—have barely spoken to one another after the death of their father. While each of them headed in a distinct and difference direction, their upbringing—and the yearly trips their mother took them on—affected them greatly.

This novel is told in the point of view of all four siblings and moves from the present (2025) to the past effortlessly, without adding confusion. Smith does an awesome job of capturing the voice of each sibling. It’s hard to have a favorite though as an oldest child, I identified with Gemma’s extra responsibilities. Families are messy but also necessary. This book did a great job in capturing both of these qualities.

Four and a half stars.

My thanks to the author, the publisher, and NetGalley for this great read.

Thank you NetGalley for the opportunity to read this book. I was laughing and crying and laughing through the tears. I have three older siblings and we are all very different and have gone in various directions with life, so this book felt like a warm hug and a look into our own lives in a way.

Excellent novel. I hope Jennifer Smith gets all the accolades and attention for this one. BUT, should have been named "The Exceptional Endicotts."

I adored The Unsinkable Gretta James and jumped at the chance for an early release of this novel. Fun for the Whole Family delivers. It is emotionally deft, gripping, and Smith's characters will stick with you for a long time.

Smith weaves a then/now timeline. The Exceptional Endicotts--a pro footballer, an oscar nominated actress, a national book award author and the oldest that raised them all. When their mother leaves and father is largely absent, the four Endicotts forge bonds. Their only contact with their mother is their summer road trips. She obsessively checks off states with the goal to hit 50. We enter to the youngest and famed actress, Jude, summoning them to break their three year estrangement after a big fight following their father's funeral--in North Dakota.

Fun for the Whole Famliy shines a spotlight on four very different siblings working through their differences and shared trauma. The subject matter is heavy but the delivery is delightful. The characters will interest the reader in a way that will make them think for a long time. And, grab the tissues.