Early Morning Riser by Katherine Heiny

Early Morning Riser

Author: Katherine Heiny

Genre: Contemporary Fiction

Date: 22 September 2021

Rating: 3 stars

Review: This book was kind of like the Marie biscuit of biscuits. It is good. It is sweet. It is a little boring. My dog loves it. But there is nothing really special about it. It is not a Hide & Seek, or a chocolate chip cookie. But nor is it a Nice biscuit. (If you are someone who likes Nice biscuits, you are welcome to leave.) The book was nice. It was sweet. It was a little boring. I read it and it was a fun time.

The book is about 26-year old Jane who is a second grade teacher. She meets Duncan, a man who is much older than her, when she gets locked out of her house. She immediately falls for his charms but there is a catch, Duncan has seemingly slept with almost every woman in Boyne City. Wherever Jane goes she is bound to find someone who has been with Duncan. Most prominently there is Duncan’s ex-wife, Aggie, who is fair-haired, a great cook and kind of the perfect wife. Then there is Jimmy, a slightly slow young man who works for Duncan. Everyone in Boyne City is part of Jane’s relationship, when all she really wants is to be left alone with Duncan. Then an incident one day ensures that their lives are forever entangled.

This book is filled with quirky, eccentric characters. There is Jane’s constant mandolin playing, jealous of all other musicians best friend Frieda. There is Aggie’s husband Gary, with his wandering mind and strange aversions. There is Jane’s colleague, the drunk second grade teacher from hell. Each character is filled with so much personality that they feel like they will walk right off the page and into your life. In that sense, the book reminded me a little of Anuja Chauhan’s writing. Some of my favourite parts of this book were when Jane spoke about the kids in her class and the crazy antics they got up to. They made me nostalgic for all the stories my Mom would bring back from school, where she used to teach pre-primary students, back when there was physical school. It was also really fun to see different professions represented in the book. I don’t think I have read enough books about primary teachers. Need to change that.

The book starts in the year 2002 and ends in 2019. In the middle, the narrator keeps dipping in and out of Jane’s life, giving a comprehensive view of all that happens in the almost two decades in the middle. My biggest complaint with the book was probably that several times during the book instead of telling us the events as they happen, so we can be part of the action, the narrator cut off right at the most crucial moments. Then a few pages later, or in the next chapter, the narrator would be back to say, “Oh, this is what happened!” It was frustrating because there is the build up but no pay off. It also made it seem like I was reading all the mundane parts only to then not be a part of the drama.

The book is about dysfunctional and found families. It is about making connections in the least expected places. I think it is also partly about Duncan just being a jerk, but oh well, maybe that’s just me. I was going through reviews by other readers of this book on Goodreads after reading the book, as one does, and realised that a lot of them say that Heiny’s other book is really great. Maybe I’ll pick that one up sometime soon and read it just to compare the two. The book, unfortunately, didn’t leave much of an impression on me so I don’t have much to say about it. But it is a Marie biscuit, not bad at all.