Fiction Review: Falling Together

Last year, I read Love Walked In by Marisa De los Santos and enjoyed the novel, so I was eager to read her latest book, Falling Together.  I listened to it on audio, and I enjoyed the story and the narration, though I felt that it sort of rambled and lost focus at times.

Falling Together tells a rather complex story of three best friends who met in college.  Pen, Cat, and Will (yes, unusual names) were inseparable throughout their college years and felt they had a unique, unbreakable bond that would last a lifetime.  But, after college, they agreed to split up and have no contact with each other, for reasons that are explained later in the novel.  Six years later, Pen and Will each get an urgent and mysterious e-mail from Cat, asking them to come to their college reunion to meet her.

The novel switches back and forth between the present and the past, gradually filling in the story of how the friends met and, eventually, why they parted.  In the present storyline, the reader learns what Pen and Will have each been doing since they said good-bye and how their lives have changed in the intervening years.

It’s a good story, unique and well told, with likable main characters.  At times, I felt that the narrative wandered a bit and lost focus, occasionally straying off on a tangent.  This could have been in part due to the way I listen to audio books; I rarely have more than 15 minutes at a time to listen, so I hear the story in short increments.  But overall, I liked Pen and Will, and I wanted them to reunite with Cat and work out all of their problems.  It’s a story not only about friendship but also about love and family. 

HarperAudio