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Book Summary and Reviews of Fun for the Whole Family by Jennifer E. Smith

Fun for the Whole Family by Jennifer E. Smith

Fun for the Whole Family

A Novel

by Jennifer E. Smith

  • Readers' Rating (1):
  • Published:
  • Apr 2025, 368 pages
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About this book

Book Summary

The four Endicott siblings—Gemma, Connor, Roddy, and Jude—were once inseparable, a bond created by the absence of their dazzling, mercurial mother, who would return for a few weeks each summer to whisk them off on sprawling road trips around the country.

Decades later, the unthinkable has happened: the Endicotts haven't spoken in years ... until an out-of-the-blue text arrives from Jude, now a famous actress, summoning them to a small town in North Dakota. They're each at a crossroads: Gemma, who put her own ambitions aside to raise the others, now isn't sure if she wants to be a mother herself; Connor, a celebrated novelist, is floundering after his recent divorce and suffering from an epic case of writer's block; and Roddy, at the tail end of a professional soccer career, is dangerously close to losing his future husband for the chance at one last season.

Jude is the only Endicott who seems to have it all together—but appearances can be deceiving. As the weekend unfolds, and the siblings wrestle with their shared past and uncertain futures, they'll discover that Jude has been keeping three secrets ... each of which could change everything.

A captivating journey and an ode to forgiveness that takes readers across all fifty states, Fun for the Whole Family brims with heart and resonates long after the final page.

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What are you reading this week? (04/10/2025)
I'm about 3/4 done with Jennifer E. Smith's Fun for the Whole Family, her second adult novel. The premise strains believability (four siblings, one of whom is an Oscar-nominated actress, one who's a professional athlete, and one is a National Book Award–winning novelist), but the sibling dynamics...
-Norah_Piehl

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Reviews

Media Reviews

"A layered family drama ... This novel is a page-turner, and readers will root for each of the [Endicott] siblings." —Booklist (starred review)

"A bittersweet story about finding one's purpose ... Smith's novel, which moves back and forth in time, asks serious questions about chasing one's dreams and how that may impinge upon family responsibilities." —Library Journal

"Fun for the Whole Family is a glorious novel of love in all its forms—familial, romantic, lost, and found. Jennifer E. Smith is a ray of literary sunshine." —Jenny Jackson, New York Times bestselling author of Pineapple Street

"Fun for the Whole Family is a captivating and joyful novel about siblings and family and the ties that bind us together. This is Jennifer E. Smith at her absolute best." —Laura Dave, New York Times bestselling author of The Last Thing He Told Me

This information about Fun for the Whole Family was first featured in "The BookBrowse Review" - BookBrowse's membership magazine, and in our weekly "Publishing This Week" newsletter. Publication information is for the USA, and (unless stated otherwise) represents the first print edition. The reviews are necessarily limited to those that were available to us ahead of publication. If you are the publisher or author and feel that they do not properly reflect the range of media opinion now available, send us a message with the mainstream reviews that you would like to see added.

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Author Information

Jennifer E. Smith

Jennifer E. Smith is the bestselling author of more than a dozen books, including The Unsinkable Greta James and the young adult novels The Statistical Probability of Love at First Sight and Hello, Goodbye, and Everything in Between, both of which have been adapted for film. She earned a master's degree in creative writing from the University of St. Andrews in Scotland, and her work has been translated into thirty-four languages. She lives in Los Angeles.

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