Apples Never Fall

My favorite Liane Moriarty is Big Little Lies for it’s humor and realistic characters. Apples Never Fall also has great characters and is more of a family drama then a mystery. The plot drags a bit and the addition of the pandemic at the end came across as an afterthought that didn’t add anything to the story.

This was really way drawn out and took forever to read.. I just never fully got into this one. It had a few chapters that were cool, but overall, it's just not my type of read!

Liane Moriarty somehow managed to turn a missing woman, a suspicious husband, four divided siblings, and a mysterious stranger into a book where remarkably little happens. Apples Never Fall follows the Delaney family. They are a wealthy Australian tennis family whose lives begin unraveling after Joy Delaney disappears. Her husband, Stan, quickly becomes the obvious suspect. Their four adult children are left deciding whether their father could have killed their mother. The family already has decades of resentment, competition, and disappointment simmering beneath the surface. Joy’s disappearance gives everyone a reason to start digging through their buried resentment. The story had plenty of potential for an interesting domestic mystery. The Delaneys definitely have complicated relationships with each other. Moriarty spends considerable time exploring the difference between how a family appears from the outside and what actually happens inside their home. The problem was how long it took to tell their story. This book is unnecessarily long. I kept zoning out during conversations, memories, and family conflicts because so much of the material seemed to contribute very little to the mystery. Tennis also dominates the Delaney family’s identity. I know almost nothing about tennis, so many of those sections made me wonder when we were getting back to the missing mother. The family drama became exhausting to wade through. The siblings divide themselves into teams based on whether they believe Stan killed Joy. Their loyalties frequently feel influenced by old grievances rather than evidence. The boys land on one side while the girls land on the other. The gender division felt strangely convenient. Everyone has money, careers, childhood disappointments, parental issues, and decades of competitive tennis baggage to unpack. At some point, I realized I was reading a very elaborate collection of rich people problems disguised as a murder mystery. I was amazed by the sheer number of Taylor Swift references. I am a Swiftie. I enjoy a Taylor reference as much as anyone. Apples Never Fall reached a level where I started wondering how many times a novelist could mention Taylor Swift before she became an unofficial member of the Delaney family. A mystery this long needed a thrilling conclusion that justified spending so much time beside this family’s problems. I did not get a dramatic ending. The eventual explanations were not exciting after spending hundreds of pages building suspicion around the family. My reaction to the twists was, "Seriously, that was it?" Pick this up if you have the patience for slow domestic fiction, complicated family relationships, tennis, and character studies. I found myself waiting much too long time for very little to happen in the end.

I've read many books by Liane Moriarty and loved them all (except for Nine Perfect Strangers). Moriarty knows how to write about complex families, flawed personalities, secrets and lots of drama. She knows how to write about the human emotions and dynamics of each family member. I felt like I knew each of her characters in this slow burn family drama. There are so many things I loved about this book, the details, the family, the mysterious stranger and the minor characters sprinkled throughout, the snarky humor.

The Delaney family is a tennis family, a tennis dynasty in their younger years. From the moment Stan and Joy meet, the chemistry is undeniable. They are killers on the tennis court and start a tennis academy where they coached many hopeful athletes, including their 4 children. After 50 years of marriage, they have finally sold their tennis academy and are embarking their golden years, only they don't quite know what they means for them. Then suddenly, one day Joy goes missing. Stan doesn't seem too concerned, but his children are. Two of them even file a missing person's report. Does the stranger who turned up on their doorstep have a hand in any of this? And where has that stranger gone?

The writing was great. The story was told through multiple points of view (so you get to see everyone's perspective and thoughts) and different timelines (past leading up to Joy going missing and present day going forward). Far distant past is also sprinkled in to develop characters even more.

I really enjoyed this family sage but is was a tad too long for me; hence the 4.5 stars.

OK. I am a fan of Moriarty. She is a fav. But, this one dragged a little for me. Kinda like 'Nine Perfect Strangers'. The first half of the book could have been shortened. And tennis isn't my thing. Mother goes missing, father is a little clueless. Kids are dysfunctional. Typical starting plot for any good Moriarty book. Really wanted to like this one, but three stars for writing well... And well, for being Moriarty.