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The Most Fun We Ever Had by Claire Lombardo Review: A Sprawling, Spiked Family Saga
Claire Lombardo's debut novel is a multigenerational family saga centered on the Sorenson family — parents David and Marilyn, still passionately in love after four decades, and their four adult daughters whose rivalries and secrets threaten to unravel everything — earning a New York Times Bestseller designation, a Women's Prize for Fiction nomination, and selection as a Reese's Book Club Pick.
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Best for
Readers who love expansive American family sagas — think Anne Tyler or Jonathan Franzen — and want a multigenerational novel that balances dark comedy, sisterly rivalry, and a decades-long love story with genuine literary ambition.
Worth it if
You're drawn to psychologically intricate domestic fiction and are happy to commit to a large, slowly accumulating cast across multiple decades — especially if you read with a book club that can dig into its layered characters and recurring symbolic threads.
Skip if
You prefer lean, tightly plotted narratives or morally complex central relationships throughout — the novel's deliberately unhurried pace and its idealized portrait of David and Marilyn's marriage may frustrate rather than reward you.
What readers & critics say
Kirkus Reviews praised it as "a sharp, sly family story of feminine guile and guilt," calling Lombardo's debut "fun and brimming" with a particular kind of female intelligence. Open Kimono Publishing described the prose as "lush without being heavy, balancing humor and heartbreak in a way that makes the novel impossible to put down," and noted it was hailed on selection as a "brilliant" and "addictive" family saga that is "sprawling in scope yet intimate at its core."
“Four Chicago sisters anchor a sharp, sly family story of feminine guile and guilt — a fun and brimming tale.”
— Kirkus Reviews4.1from 30,380 Amazon ratings— reader ratings, not a LuvemBooks score
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The Most Fun We Ever Had is a multigenerational American family saga following the Sorenson family — from David and Marilyn's still-passionate forty-year marriage to the four adult daughters whose rivalries and buried secrets threaten to unravel everything — earning a New York Times Bestseller designation, a Women's Prize for Fiction nomination, and a Reese's Book Club Pick selection on debut. Lombardo's command of a sprawling cast across decades, praised by Jane Smiley as "ambitious and brilliantly written," makes this a natural fit for readers of Anne Tyler and Jonathan Franzen who want psychological depth, dark comedy, and structural surprise in equal measure. Readers who prefer lean, tightly plotted narratives should note the novel's deliberately accumulative pace and substantial length.
- Is it worth reading?
- For readers drawn to expansive domestic fiction in the tradition of Anne Tyler or Jonathan Franzen, The Most Fun We Ever Had is a compelling case for the multigenerational family saga's staying power — a debut that earned both a Women's Prize for Fiction nomination and New York Times Bestseller status, a rare dual achievement. Lombardo's ability to bring a huge cast to life with 'humor, vividness and acute psychological depth' (Penguin Random House) gives the novel both emotional momentum and literary seriousness. The key caveat is its scale: the novel's deliberate, accumulative pace asks a real commitment of the reader, and those who prefer tightly plotted or lean narratives may find the investment uneven.
- Similar books
- Readers who love The Most Fun We Ever Had tend to gravitate toward other ambitious, character-driven literary fiction. The God of the Woods by Liz Moore shares its multigenerational scope and layered family secrets. Where the Crawdads Sing by Delia Owens similarly blends emotional depth with a slowly surfacing hidden truth. Eleanor Oliphant Is Completely Fine by Gail Honeyman offers the same dark humor wrapped around family damage and psychological complexity. The Goldfinch by Donna Tartt is another large-canvas literary novel praised for its psychological intricacy and sprawling emotional ambition — a natural companion for readers drawn to Lombardo's accumulative style.
- Who should read this?
- The Most Fun We Ever Had is best suited for adult readers who love expansive domestic fiction — specifically those who respond to the psychologically intricate family sagas of Anne Tyler or Jonathan Franzen. Readers who enjoy dark comedy woven through family drama, long-form character studies with a large ensemble cast, and novels that reward patience with emotional and structural payoff will find it a natural fit. It is also an ideal pick for book clubs, given its layered cast, recurring symbolic architecture (the gingko trees, Violet's secret), and the abundant discussion material generated by the four daughters' competing perspectives.
- About Claire Lombardo
- From the suburbs of Oak Park, Illinois, New York Times bestselling author Claire Lombardo burst onto the literary scene with her remarkable debut The Most Fun We Ever Had in 2019.
- Tell me about the adaptation
- The Most Fun We Ever Had has been optioned for television by Reese Witherspoon, adding to the novel's already considerable industry recognition as a Reese's Book Club Pick. The TV option reflects both the story's broad popular appeal and the structural richness of its multigenerational cast — the Sorenson family's decades-spanning rivalries and secrets offer substantial material for a series format. No release date or production details are confirmed in available sources.
- What are the main themes?
- The novel's central themes are family loyalty, inherited damage, sisterhood, and the tension between idealized love and lived dysfunction. David and Marilyn's enduring romance serves as both an anchor and an irritant for their four daughters — a model of partnership that alternately inspires and burdens the next generation. Recurring imagery of gingko trees threads through the narrative as a symbolic meditation on growth, persistence, and family continuity. The review also identifies dark comedy as a tonal throughline, with the sisterly rivalries rendered as much with wry humor as with dramatic weight.
- Is this a good book club pick?
- The Most Fun We Ever Had is well-suited for book clubs. The review specifically highlights the novel's 'layered cast and its explicit symbolic architecture — those recurring gingko trees, Violet's late-revealed secret — offer abundant material for discussion.' The four daughters' competing perspectives naturally generate disagreement among readers, and the central question of whether David and Marilyn's idealized marriage is inspiring or unrealistic is itself a rich discussion prompt. Its Reese's Book Club Pick designation reflects the same assessment.
Summarize this book
Is it worth reading?
Who should read this?
About Claire Lombardo
Tell me about the adaptation
What are the main themes?
Is this a good book club pick?
Summarize this book
The Most Fun We Ever Had traces the Sorenson family across several decades, beginning in the 1970s when Marilyn Connolly and David Sorenson fall in love and extending to a tumultuous present year in which their four adult daughters recklessly reignite old rivalries. The catalyst is a long-buried secret that surfaces and threatens to upend the lives each daughter has carefully constructed. Throughout, Lombardo uses recurring imagery — most notably the gingko trees that appear from the opening scene through David and Marilyn's early courtship and beyond — as a structuring symbolic thread. The result is a novel that works simultaneously as dark comedy, family drama, and a character study with genuine structural surprise.
Follow up
What is the buried secret?
How is the story structured across time?
What is the tone of the novel?
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Age & Reading Level
Recommended age
Adult
Reading level
Adult
3 content notes · who it suits
Content to know about
family dysfunction and psychological manipulation
infidelity (referenced)
adoption-related identity conflict
Skip if you prefer lean, tightly plotted narratives over slow-burn multigenerational character studies.
Our Review
Claire Lombardo's debut novel is a multigenerational saga with the staying power to earn both major award recognition and a devoted popular following — a rare combination for a first work of fiction.
What the Novel Actually Is
Back cover synopsis describing four adult daughters of a Chicago couple and a family secret.
The Most Fun We Ever Had is a multigenerational novel tracing the Sorenson family across decades. When Marilyn Connolly and David Sorenson fall in love in the 1970s, they are, as the novel's own synopsis frames it, blithely ignorant of all that's to come. Their marriage — depicted as still passionately intact after forty years — becomes both the anchor and the irritant for their four adult daughters, who recklessly ignite old rivalries over the course of a tumultuous year. The catalyst is a long-buried secret that surfaces and threatens to upend the lives each daughter has carefully constructed. Lombardo earned her MFA in fiction at the Iowa Writers' Workshop and spent several years doing social work in Chicago before writing the novel — a background that informs its attention to the psychological textures of family dysfunction.
Significance and Place in the Genre
Lombardo's debut arrived as a genuinely ambitious entry into the tradition of the American family saga. The novel was a New York Times Bestseller and received a Women's Prize for Fiction nomination — two markers of both commercial reach and literary seriousness. It was later selected as a Reese's Book Club Pick, and the novel has been optioned for television by Reese Witherspoon. Critical comparisons placed it in pointed company: reviewers invoked Jonathan Franzen and Anne Tyler as reference points, situating Lombardo's work within a lineage of sprawling, psychologically intricate American domestic fiction. That the novel arrived as a debut made these comparisons all the more striking to critics.
What the Novel Does Well
The breadth of Lombardo's cast and her command of it drew consistent praise. A reception summary from Penguin Random House notes that Lombardo "juggles a huge cast of characters with seeming effortlessness, bringing each to life with humor, vividness and acute psychological" depth. A published review described it as "a rich, engrossing family saga, spiked with sisterly malice," rendered "with such skill and finely tuned interest that it feels like a quiet subversion of the traditional family saga." Jane Smiley, writing in critical coverage, called the novel "ambitious and brilliantly written." The Times UK noted that Lombardo brings "a wry, often spiky humour and tightly written style" to what it called "a moving, immersive, often very funny study of family and sisterhood." The novel's use of recurring imagery — gingko trees appear from the opening scene through David and Marilyn's early courtship and beyond — has been cited as a structuring symbolic thread running through the narrative.
Genuine Limitations and Who It May Frustrate
At its core, the novel's greatest commercial strength is also its most natural point of friction for certain readers: its scale. The story spans multiple decades and follows a large ensemble, and at the length the paperback edition runs, the commitment asked of a reader is substantial. Some readers drawn to tightly plotted fiction or lean narratives may find the novel's deliberate, accumulative pace — its willingness to sit inside a family's ordinary moments as much as its crises — a challenge rather than a pleasure. The novel's emotional center, the enduring romance between David and Marilyn, is rendered as an idealized partnership; readers who prefer moral ambiguity distributed equally across all characters, rather than concentrated in the daughters, may find that dynamic less complicated than they'd like.
Who This Novel Is Genuinely For
Readers who respond to the expansive domestic novels of Anne Tyler or Jonathan Franzen — fiction that treats the family as a sufficient universe, full of competing loyalties, inherited damage, and dark comedy — will find The Most Fun We Ever Had a natural fit. Its combination of sisterly friction, a decades-long love story, and a secret that reshapes what readers thought they understood about the Sorensons gives the novel both emotional momentum and structural surprise. Authors Margot Livesey and Affinity Konar have praised it as "gorgeous and profound" and "remarkably alive and wise," respectively — endorsements that reflect the novel's success at working simultaneously as page-turner and literary character study. For book clubs, the novel's layered cast and its explicit symbolic architecture — those recurring gingko trees, Violet's late-revealed secret — offer abundant material for discussion.
Sources & Further Reading
The key facts and claims in this review are grounded in the retrieved, verified sources listed below.
- Cited in this review
- 1
- 2
reesesbookclub.com
- 3
- Further reading
- 4
Claire Lombardo, Wikipedia
- 5
- 6
- 7
- 8
clairelombardo.com
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