The Descendants - Kaui Hart Hemmings

The Descendants

Kaui Hart Hemmings

2007

I first heard about this from this video by Kayley. I mean, I'd heard the title of the movie, but I didn't know anything about it. Her review made the book sound interesting, and so I put it on hold at the library. 

The Descendants is about the King family. They are descendants of Hawaiian royalty. Matthew King is married to Joanie and they have two daughters, 10-year old Scottie and 17-year old Alex, who is a recovering drug addict and wild-child. Joanie is in a boating accident and is now in a coma. Without giving too much more away, Joanie has a living will and does not want to be on life support, so the King Family has to start telling family and friends. This is made difficult by the fact that Joanie was seeing someone else, and Matt and his daughters must come together to find the man and tell him the news.

While there is a very good storyline in the novel, there's not much action in the plot. There is a lot of talking to various relatives and reminiscing about the good times, but it isn't a super-action-packed-lotsa-stuff-happening kind of novel. Despite this, or maybe even because of this, the book is intriguing. The characters have great growth, especially Alex. At first she's an unruly wild child with a boyfriend that Matt doesn't exactly like. Throughout the novel we learn more about her, more about this boy, and we see the relationship between Matt and Alex grow. Scottie also grows a little bit as a character. She's so young and has to deal with peer pressure at school and trying to fit in, but Alex, her boyfriend, and Matt all come together to help her.

I really enjoyed this novel. Once I got into it a little ways into the book I couldn't put it down. It moved slowly at times, but I was constantly learning new facts about the characters and Joanie's life, so it didn't feel like nothing was happening. I'm going to have to see the movie at some point, though I've heard mixed reviews about it.

The book is available for purchase from Amazon here: The Descendants: A Novel, or from your local bookseller or library.

I give this book 3.8 out of 5 stars. I did enjoy the book, but a little bit more action might have been nice.

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Have you read this book or watched the movie? What did you think about it?