Sakura of DOOM

Judging from the copyright page, these were all originally short stories about the same family and compiled into a novel. Novel? Group of short stories? They're all arranged chronologically so it's hard to tell.

Mostly it's about the Samuelson family -- Franny Samuelson has cancer, Jason is the promising son who gets way off track, Margo is the cousin who is constantly searching for love. Gretel is the daughter who observes all of this, starting from when her father divorces Franny.

I feel sort of bad complaining about the fact that pretty much everything goes wrong for this family; I know things like this do happen in real life. It just didn't work so well for me in this book, largely because I felt a bit as though Hoffman was just piling on tragedy after tragedy for the sake of itself. And while I could sort of connect the dots to some of the events, such as Jason throwing away his future as a reaction to his parents' troubles, Hoffman either deliberately or accidentally never makes these connections clear.

I suppose it's part of the style, but it still irks me.

There are some beautiful bits, at least. I was a little disappointed because I really loved her Practical Magic, from the imagery to the slightly dreamy fantasy quality. Some parts of Local Girls recaptures that feeling for me -- Franny sick with cancer, watching herself, Margo's plagues, etc. -- but not enough.

Ok, but a bit disappointing.