A Separation-A Novel, Katie Kitamura, author; Katherine Waterston, narrator
This novel is about a marriage that has failed. Our main character has separated from her husband and is keeping the separation secret as per his wishes. She is not close to her mother-in-law, Isabella, who is a bit of snob and who views her as a foreigner. Her husband, Christopher is British and she is not. For some reason, she seems to be totally disinterested in discovering why he does not wish anyone to know about their problems, even though she now wants to file for divorce because she has been having an affair and hopes to remarry.
Out of the blue, she gets a phone call from her mother-in-law, who is in the dark about their marital woes, demanding to know where her son is. Apparently he is no longer answering her phone calls. She advises her daughter-in-law that Christopher is in Greece, something she had not known because she had not recently been in touch with him. Her rather forceful and arrogant mother-in-law then demanded that she go and find him. She had already purchased her airline ticket and arranged for her to get to the hotel her son was visiting. When she arrived at the hotel, she was told he was not in his room. Soon it became apparent that although he was scheduled to check out of the hotel, he was no where to be seen. He was in Greece, supposedly, researching grief and the customs surrounding it, for a book he was writing. However, it was soon revealed that he was completely disloyal to his marriage vows and was a bit of a philanderer.
As the rather uninspiring search for Christopher commences, the book soon descends into somewhat of an analysis of grief rather than an evolving mystery, although there is another woman in the background who has a jealous boyfriend. The effort of the author simply did not connect with me. It was easy to read, but the plot was thin, and the dialogue was often a bit monotonous.
I would not recommend it because it really went no place. There was no great reveal, no surprising revelation of a secret, nor was there a resolution of anything. At the end, it was as it was in the beginning. There were unresolved issues and they remained unresolved.
The narrator was consistent in her presentation which was pretty matter of fact with little alteration of expression or tone. I thought she sounded bored, as I often was, with the dialogue that went absolutely nowhere.

Book was well written and easy to read. From the readings of the blurb I expected more dramatic unfoldings in the story.

I felt the ending was more of a lifes tale or cautionary warnings. I had expected a greater finale.

I felt there were parts if the story being eluded to however the plot on those did not evetuate and I thought parts of the story were missing.

I tried, but cannot agree with the other reviewers. One of the worst books i ever read. I can't relate to the charters...nothing about any of them is appealing; prose is awful. The only reason i finished it , is because it was short and was looking for some kind of conclusion. Left me high and dry.