Would have liked to give this 3.5 stars. There are two alternating 1st person narrators in this book. The first, a young woman named Alice, is fairly engaging, although trapped inside a hackneyed plot device: having to return home because of a dying parent. The second narrator takes a lot longer to get a bead on, and I would have liked to get a sense of his importance to the story earlier on. For quite a while I felt as if those alternating chapters were just sort of drifting. Halfway through, though, things started to make sense, and I found that narrator, Daniel, more engaging. Overall, a well-written novel, with engaging characters and a nuanced view of families, obligation, and the ways in which our failure to come to terms with life's disappointments affects those around us.