All Adults Here by Emma Straub

Rating: 7/10

‘All Adults Here’ is, shockingly, not really about adults. I suppose it is in the sense that the main players in the Strick family are old (the mother, Astrid, I assumed was around 70??), but the book also highlights the younger family members and their time existing in a town their mother/grandmother would apparently die in the street for. 

This book includes a lot of feel-good, heartwarming, cry-yourself-into-a-long-nap moments. Although I did not find that any character particularly grabbed me while reading (minus Robin – I would do anything for her happiness), I did become invested in making sure everyone was smiling at the end. 

This book felt like it was about nothing in particular, I thought it would be about the matriarch (Astrid) finding out why someone in her town got hit by a bus, or the granddaughter (Cecilia) being thrown into a new school for apparently being bullied over being morally upstanding, or even the deep-seated trauma the eldest of Astrid’s children (Elliot) being so goddamn withdrawn and moody, because his mother thought him being a lawyer, was a bad idea. BUT it wasn’t really focused on any of that. I am not entirely sure what the “point” of this book was. It perhaps didn’t need one. It was a nice read, with low stakes. Every single person is dealing with something in this story, and it’s kind of up to you how shallow or minuscule it is. But to them, trust me, it’s freaking huge. I felt like maybe only two characters were actually going through something. This book hits upon topics of LGBTQA+, death, bad (or at least questionable) parenting styles, the preservation of small towns against big businesses, and love. It’s basically a Hallmark movie.