Well written and vaguely interesting but I gave up waiting for more to happen before I ever found out why this family gained its various superpowers. I was sold on this by a number of reviews but found it lacking in a plot to hold my interest. ( )

Well written and vaguely interesting but I gave up waiting for more to happen before I ever found out why this family gained its various superpowers. I was sold on this by a number of reviews but found it lacking in a plot to hold my interest. ( )

This was another lucky First Reads win. I was sold on the concept after reading the book's description. Weirdly enough, the British television show Misfits came to mind. From the book page...

But instead of crimes to fight and villains to vanquish, they confront inner demons, and their extraordinary abilities prove not to be magic weapons so much as expressions of their fears and longings as they struggle to come to terms with who they are and what fate deals them.

Expectations were high. I love the idea of people gaining super powers and yet not becoming superheroes. I was especially interested in seeing how such a story would unfold in the context of a family.

The stories--and these are really more like short stories tied together by the connections the characters share across tales--have a linear progression. Each chapter focuses on a different member of the family and jumps a little (or a lot) further in time as the book moves along. Each time the reader is dropped down right at the moment the character discovers his or her power. Kept me on my toes. Kept me on my toes right up until the end where the book seemed to lose a little steam.

[b:What the Family Needed|15815357|What the Family Needed|Steven Amsterdam|http://d.gr-assets.com/books/1350922470s/15815357.jpg|17415004] wasn't perfect but I was glad of the journey it took me on. We shall meet again [a:Steven Amsterdam|2958060|Steven Amsterdam|http://d.gr-assets.com/authors/1316938663p2/2958060.jpg]. ( )

I was happy to receive a copy of What the Family Needed. I enjoyed the author's previous novel, Things We Didn't See Coming. I liked how this book is broken up by character, but coupled with the jumps in time, I felt the story was a bit disjointed. And with each chapter being on the longer side, it felt like I was reading a bunch of short stories. I ended up wanting to hear more about certain characters (Ruth) and less about others (Alek). Each character also possesses a supernatural power, which you realize as each chapter enfolds, but sometimes that confused me. For example, if Ruth had the ability to hear other people's unspoken thoughts, then how come she couldn't hear what her family was thinking? Only strangers? I think the supernatural power idea is a great one, but it needed to be implemented more consistently. Overall, I would recommend the book and it's a fairly quick read. ( )

Steven Amsterdam's "What the Family Needed" takes an interesting premise -- members of a regular, slightly dysfunctional family receive different superpowers loosely connected to their individual strengths and fears -- and develops it into a series of disconnected and ultimately unfulfilling short narratives.

The prose itself is crisp and unpretentious; my main problems with the book were the discontinuity between the "chapters," which are set years apart, and the lack of any thematic cohesion across the stories. I kept expecting Amsterdam to build towards some narrative climax tying the individual stories together, but the ending only left me with more questions about what exactly he was trying to convey.

"What the Family Needed" is a prime example of both the strengths and weaknesses of much of modern literature: technical proficiency that signifies little.

Disclosure: I received a free copy of this book through LibraryThing's Early Reviewer program. ( )