Pippa Dunn was adopted in America soon after her birth 28 years ago and raised in the UK along with her sister Charlotte, her parents' natural daughter. Despite the mutual love between Pippa and her parents and her close relationship with her younger sister Charlotte, something has always been missing from Pippa's life: the security of knowing who she really is and where she came from. As a result of this insecurity, she is unable to commit to any romantic relationship, always leaving first before she can be left. After finally tracking down her birth parents, Pippa is delighted to finally see herself reflected in someone else's mannerisms and looks, but after she moves to America to get to know her new found family, some cracks appear in the facade of her wonderful new relationships. Larkin writes with a wonderful combination of pathos and hilarity in this novel, which is based in part on her own life experience as an adoptee. For her sake I hope it was just the basic premise and not actual people that inspired many of her characters!
Pippa's adoptive British parents are understanding and supportive of her decisions to seek out the people who gave her up and there is no hint of drama or discord in her relationship with them. Birth mother Billie, who is in the business of representing up and coming artists of all types, comes from a family supposedly riddled with "mental illness' and nearly every relative that Pippa meets or hears mention of suffers from some form of depression, bi-polar disorder, alcoholism, ADHD, or criminal insanity (or could they all just be so narcissistic and self-involved that they appear "crazy" to normal, functional people?). Her father has a career and family life that are cloaked in mystery.
Pippa is not looking for a world where the grass is greener, where all her problems and self-doubts will disappear. She just wants to know where and who she came from. She gets more than she bargained for during the process, and I enjoyed every step of her journey. I was surprised by the number of people on Goodreads that didn't particularly enjoy this novel. I found it witty and very humorous an I would recommend it.
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