Flight Patterns

By: Karen White
Published Year: 2016
Publisher: NAL
Pages: 416

Amazon Barnes and Noble

I received this book in exchange for an honest review. This in no way shape or form influenced my opinion.

Summary (Provided by Goodreads): Georgia Chambers has spent her life sifting through other people’s pasts while trying to forget her own. But then her work as an expert of fine china—especially of Limoges—requires her to return to the one place she swore she’d never revisit...

It’s been thirteen years since Georgia left her family home on the coast of Florida, and nothing much has changed, except that there are fewer oysters and more tourists. She finds solace seeing her grandfather still toiling away in the apiary where she spent much of her childhood, but encountering her estranged mother and sister leaves her rattled. 

Seeing them after all this time makes Georgia realize that something has been missing—and unless she finds a way to heal these rifts, she will forever be living vicariously through other people’s remnants. To embrace her own life—mistakes and all—she will have to find the courage to confront the ghosts of her past and the secrets she was forced to keep...

                                                             First Impressions

The cover of this book reminded me of summertime and I definitely wanted to pick it up. It looked like it would be a fun light book. The summary also sounded interesting with a main character who was returning to her family after thirteen years away.

                                                               What I thought

The cover for this book totally does not fit the actual story. As much as I love how pretty t is, it is completely deceiving. Based on the cover alone, you would get the impression that this book is going to be a light chick-lit. It is definitely so much more and darker than I ever would have thought it would be. I feel like it’s going to miss some of the market that would enjoy it because they won’t realize how much mystery there is to this story just by glancing at the cover.

In Flight Patterns, Georgie Chambers returns to her hometown after 13 years away to find a piece of china that she remembered seeing years ago. She works for a firm that valuates old items and estates and she specializes in china. James Graf comes from New York with his grandmother’s china set, sparking the search for a piece of matching china Georgia remembers from her childhood home. Heading back she has to face a sister who she hasn’t talked to in 13 years, a mother who hasn’t spoken in 10, a niece who she hasn’t seen since she was a baby, and her Grandfather the beekeeper.

Oddly enough, one of my favorite parts of this book was the beekeeping. The beginning of each chapter had a piece of information about bees taken from the Grandfather’s beekeeper journal. It was obvious that White did a lot of research on bees and beekeeping and I enjoyed all of the interesting facts about the bees.

I also felt like the alternating chapters worked very nicely. It was helpful to be able to see two parts of the arguments and history. White also included chapters from Birdie’s (the mom who had a mental breakdown) point of view. It was a unique perspective because it showed home sometimes what a person is hiding inside of their head is so different from what they show.

While on the surface this book seems like it would be a cute romance with some family drama, there is a lot of depth to the characters and what they go through. There is mystery in how James Graf’s grandmother’s china ended up with the Chambers as well as some family relations. While I was able to predict some of the twists, there were a few (darker) ones that I definitely did not predict! 
 

This book was enjoyable and the characters very strongly developed. However, the overall story oved a bit slowly for my tastes. I also wish there had a little bit more of the romance, since I had expected more. If you’re looking for a book that straddle chick-lit with contemporary fiction with a bit of mystery this book is for you. It is well written and enjoyable and I never felt like I didn’t want to read it. I don’t think I would read it again or purchase it for myself, but I would recommend it if someone picked it up!

Edit- This is a book that has stayed with me weeks after reading it. I have found myself thinking about parts of the story line and the characters. Because of this, I bumped up my original rating. Originally I had this book at a Borrow, but because it left such an impression I felt like I needed to move it up to a Borrow-Beloved.