Review - 'Here One Moment' by Liane Moriarty

"Cause of death, age of death."

There are certain themes that speak to just about every reader, and the idea of learning your future is one of them. What would you do if you knew how long you had left to live? Would you try to change the outcome for the better, or just surrender to destiny? Those are the thoughts that every single passenger on the flight from Hobart to Sydney would grapple with in the weeks and months following that fateful journey.

But the problem with that theme is that inevitably, the premise is more profound than what comes after. And so here, we have the same problem. After the portentous event, we follow multiple characters as they go back to living their lives, and they're all the sort of somewhat interesting but mostly humdrum lives you'd expect of anyone learning they could (or could not) die in the near (or far) future.

I don't blame Liane Moriarty, at least not entirely. I can't recall a single time any book has tried to tackle this theme and ended up wowing me. No doubt it's a seductive topic, but it's one where when you dig a little deeper, the result can only be one cliché after another — live each day as if it's your last, do the thing you've been putting off, don't let love pass you by, open your eyes to what's in front of you, so on and so forth.

But what I do blame Liane Moriarty for is the extreme unevenness between the various points of view. In true ensemble cast style, every character must have a turn, no matter how compelling or dull their perspectives. And it's just our luck that the one Moriarty chooses to focus on the most, the lady who makes the predictions, is the dullest of them all.

At least with the other characters' points of view, they have all just learned of their supposed demise, and so there is something worthwhile and interesting to fixate on. But with Cherry, there isn't anything of that sort. She's the catalyst of everyone else's crisis, but she herself is rather boring, fussy, and even a bit unlikeable. Yet, for some inexplicable reason, we are forced to read through her entire origin story, and it really sucked the life out of the whole tale.

I'm honestly puzzled. This book was way too long for its content, and we could've easily trimmed off the bulk of the meander by condensing or even axing Cherry's point of view. But as it stands, her parts were such a nonstory, they just added dull upon dull to the narrative. I thought maybe her account was included because we would eventually come upon some incredible revelation or insight, but no, I read/skimmed through it all just to be sure there wasn't.

Liane Moriarty does best when she focuses on dysfunctional domestic drama while adding in her signature sprinkles of wit and satire. But this story veered too far off course. Even though some of the characters were interesting, the Cherry narrative really dragged the whole thing down and left me with a rather tedious taste in my mouth.

Readaroo Rating: 3 stars