Sheryl Sorrentino

Three Weeks With My Brother by Nicholas Sparks
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

3.5 stars, but I choose to round down because this book has gotten a lot of hype which perhaps left me feeling disappointed.

The story wasn't what I expected. It's formatted as one part travel guide, one part memoir. I found the travel portions somewhat boring, inasmuch as I thought this would be a travel adventure in the vein of Wild by Cheryl Strayed, or a life-and-death nail-biter like 127 Hours.

In contrast, the memoir is a sweet tribute to the enduring love between two brothers who have suffered a disproportionate amount of neglect and loss and yet conduct themselves with humor and good grace. But their individual and shared misfortunes are tempered by incredible good fortune in becoming a millionaire author and businessman, respectively. And their saintly wives--I mean, what woman with five kids (and a mostly unhelpful writer husband whose primary "chore" is getting the mail so he can escape the household chaos) says, with a smile on her face, "Sure honey, take this three week around-the-world vacation with your brother while I stay here taking care of our five kids"?! I confess I lost all affinity with the author from that moment forward.

That being said, Three Weeks With My Brother contained enough touching moments and moving passages to keep me engaged and earn a "better than average" rating.

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