The Accidental Book Club by Jennifer Scott was a monthly read for our book club. Books with "book" or anything "book like" in the title always draw me in. I might have picked it up even if it were not the choice of my book club. It was a quick and easy read and "okay." Knowing what meaning being in a book club has for me, I expected and hoped for more.

Read my complete review at http://www.memoriesfrombooks.com/2021/11/the-accidental-book-club.html ( )

Jean is stronger than she thinks and boy is her strength tested.

Jean lost her husband two years ago, the man was truly the other part of her. She's spent the last two years living alone because her two children are adults.

She started a book club after losing her husband. The book club sounds like great fun, they each make a nice dish to bring and they share dinner and drinks and book talk. They've become Jean's closest friends.

One day Jean gets a call, he son-in-law asks if Bailey can stay with her. This all comes about after some major drama with Jean's daughter and rehab.

So Jean pretty much inherits this teenager who can be absolutely awful at times. It's a real test of her love and patience to try to do right for her grand daughter even while she's constantly being tested by her.

Great characters.
Bailey was a pain in the butt for a long time but you can understand how hurt she's been
Jean's daughter is just unlikeble in my opinion though. But I guess if she'd been more likable than that would have changed the book a lot.

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The Accidental Book Club was a little hard for me to get into at first. I didn’t care for the main characters, Jean and Bailey. They drove me bonkers. But in the end I wound up really feeling for these characters.


Jean doesn’t know how to be a widow. She’s always sad, and can’t seem to move on. She’s extremely lucky she has the wonderful group of women in her book club to keep her occupied. I absolutely love her friend Loretta. She says the most off the wall things, and brings so much humor to the group. I think the fact that Jean is extremely mopey in the beginning is what I didn’t care for at first, or it could be her almost non-existent relationship with her granddaughter. She just doesn’t seem to care about anything except living in the past.


Bailey is a hot mess. She does outrageous things to get attention. She knows that’s why she does it, but she still continues with the shenanigans. I can understand her need for someone to notice her, but there are other ways to make that happen. I think her living with her grandmother was a great thing for her. It opened her eyes to more than just her problems.


Both Jean and Bailey grow so much throughout this novel. They break out of their shells, and learn that it’s okay to be sad and grieve, but not to let the world pass you by. Everyone has problems, but it’s how you handle it that makes the difference.



This book makes a great book club read. I’m even going to suggest it to mine. :D ( )

The home is a place of sanctuary for many children, but what happens when that is not the case? This book is about a girl from a broken home and a grandmother with a crushed soul. Both feel lost and defeated, but do not realize that if they look at what is in front of them, they might see what needs to be seen. Jean Vison is a widower that is unable to move beyond her spouse’s passing. Due to her husband’s traumatic death, Jean has hidden herself away in her home. In order to save herself from inner turmoil, she has slowly decided to re-enter the living domain. One of her small steps back into the real world has been the creation of a book club. It is in these monthly meetings, that Jean has had the opportunity to maintain healthy relationships with various ladies. However, it is not long before she gets a call from her son-in-law that asks her to come assist him with her daughter. From there Jean is thrown in the world of utter chaos, for the daughter she raised is nothing like the one that left home. Jean must somehow help herself, save her daughter, and be a parent figure to her granddaughter Bailey. Can Bailey learn to trust her grandmother? Can Jean save her daughter and her granddaughter before it is too late?

I must first admit that I was not too keen on this book when I received it. I have never been one to read chick lit books, but I have to admit that I was pleasantly wrong. I found myself enjoying this book from the beginning to the end. I loved the brutal honesty that came along with the characters and I liked how the author did not try to sugar coat anything. The author kept things pretty damn real. As a person who has a family member that is female, a mother, and an alcoholic; this book came pretty close to home. She did a very good job portraying some of the things that can happen between mothers and daughters when alcohol is involved. I loved how the relationships were formed and how Jean struggled to manage her personal life and monitor her daughter’s mental health. I valued the characters in the book and enjoyed the diversity. Each one was unique and none were dull. I highly recommend this book to those that are looking for something different to read. It was a nice change from what I have been reading lately. I must thank both the author and goodreads for sending me this book in a giveaway. It was much appreciated and I will be passing it along to a friend! ( )

An interesting work of fiction that touches on the relationships between wives and husbands, parents and adult children, parents and children, grandparents and grandchildren and the importance of support groups of friends who can come together and offer, if nothing else, a listening ear and presence. I liked this book which dealt with the grieving process of one widow and the relationship dynamic between her and her granddaughter, a troubled youth whose parents were so involved with their own issues they had no time for hers. ( )