Between the Covers: We Ain’t the Brontes

When I spied the cover of Roslyn McMillian’s “We Ain’t the Brontes” my first thought was this book would be a fictional account of the real life relationship between best selling author Terry McMillian and her sister Roslyn and I was eager to get started. After reading this book I was more upset that I wasted a few hours reading this book although if you are truly looking for an escape,

From the Amazon description of the book:
Charity Evans and Lynzee Lavender haven’t always had the best relationship—for the most part thanks to them being writers. But while Lynzee is the wealthy, successful New York Times bestselling author of science fiction books, Charity is just squeaking by. Why is success passing her by? And why is her publisher all of a sudden reluctant to renew her contract? Now Charity suspects the worst: That her own sister has had her blacklisted! With her savings dwindling, Charity struggles to pay her bills, and the pressure is putting an incredible strain on her marriage. The rivalry goes into overdrive when Lynzee reveals that the father of the child she gave up years ago is…Charity’s husband! Charity’s life goes into a tailspin as she struggles to decide if she should tell her husband about the child he never knew he had, or if that would be just the excuse he needs to abandon her for good. She knows she has to do something, but will the path she ultimately decides to take end up destroying them all?

I really wanted to like this book. I love a good drama about family dynamics but this book left me frustrated and confused. The book starts with the two sisters on their way to an award show getting along semi well. One seemingly benign word later and we find Charity destroyed by her sister’s actions. They make up pages later and this sets the tone for the book. Charity and Lynzee fight, argue, say mean and hateful things to each other, DO mean and hateful things to each other and then make up. Charity and Lynzee’s relationship is so volatile they even have a literal fistfight yet all it takes is one night of them partying to make amends.

A huge part of the plot revolves around Charity’s marriage to Jett, a man who seems to be simultaneously jealous and eager to take advantage of Charity’s success. He seems to enjoy the good times but as soon as trouble brews he demands that Charity do as he commands. When Lynzee drops a bomb on Charity that Lynzee and Jett had a child together YEARS before Charity even married Jett it becomes Charity’s issue to tell him the truth. When the truth is revealed, instead of Jett dealing with the information like a mature person he blames Charity for keeping his daughter away from him and leaves their marriage. Only when Charity seeks attention from another man does Jett realize what he had and some shenanigan ensue.


Other observations:
For a writer, Charity never seems to be reading any books. Roslyn loves to describe in depth and with great detail how many televisions the Evans family have.

Charity enjoys lots of financial success, so much so that she can walk into a car dealer and buy a  car yet when she treats herself to dinner she foes to…Outback. I love me some Bloomin’ Onions but dang. Outback? After you’ve bought a brand new car?

General foolishness. Some parts of the book seemed to have been written by someone other than Roslyn. The conversation flowed better, the plot moved along a a good pacing and then there were the parts of the book that dragged with superfluous bits and information that had nothing to do with the central plot.

Older books by Roslyn were really good, well writer and full of great characters. This one left much to be desired and was good for passing time while I waited hours in the Emergency Room with my mom.

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