The Truth According to Us by Annie Barrows

 I was really disappointed in this big, slow, lumbering story.  Based on the author's previous work, I expected to enjoy the novel.  Instead, I found myself struggling for over a month to get anywhere close to finishing it.  Perhaps  Barrows was trying to give the reader the experience of life in slower times, but she only succeeded in giving the reader a glimpse into a life of total tedium.

Based on the publisher's blurb, I thought we'd get more of the flavor of the effects of the Great Depression on a small town in West Virginia.  The publisher says that the main character Layla Beck imagined that she "was destined, in her own opinion, to go mad with boredom".   I'm not sure if she really did, because before I could find out if Layla did,  I certainly came close to that state myself.

Too many insipid, unbelievable characters with too many agenda, and nothing spinning anyplace but around in circles.  Probably it would have been a good story if an editor had helped tighten it up, but I gave up about 3/4 of the way through.  Even a good ending isn't going to save this one.

Title: The Truth According to Us
Author: Annie Barrows
Publisher: The Dial Press (2015), Hardcover, 512 pages
Genre: Claims to be historical fiction - long on fiction, very short on history
Subject: wish I could have figured it out
Setting: fictional West Virginia town during the Great Depression
Source: review copy from the publisher
Why did I read this book now? I received it as a participant in LibraryThing.com's Early Reviewer program and was committed to review it.