Seven Days of Us by Francesca Hornak

The holidays can be a stressful time, especially for family members who aren't used to spending an extended amount of time together. Now imagine if that time were a strict seven days in which no one could visit and no one could leave. In Seven Days of Us by Francesca Hornak, that is the situation for Olivia, a humanitarian aid doctor, and her family as she returns from treating an epidemic in Liberia. Quarantined together for seven days, Olivia, her flighty younger sister, her restaurant critic father, and her caretaker mother must find a way to get along and hopefully enjoy the week between Christmas and New Year's together. Olivia is plagued, hopefully not with the virus she had been treating, but with frustration at her family's frivolousness and obliviousness with the rest of the world. Phoebe, her sister, is newly engaged and obsessed with wedding planning. Andrew, their father, has just received an email from a son he never knew he had and Emma, their mother, is hiding an illness of her own. With the close quarters it isn't long before secrets and old resentments can't stay bottled up any longer.

I really liked this book. We've all wondered if the old saying is true that you can't go home again and this book asks what we do when that is unavoidable. As children become adults it is necessary for relationships with their parents to change, but that change can be hard. Olivia wants so much to make a difference in the world and the things she has seen in Africa forever stain the way she sees the life in which she grew up. Phoebe, 28 and still living at home, just wants everything to be fun and happy, but Olivia doesn't make that easy:

The trouble was it had been so long since Olivia had been back for any length of time that Phoebe- who still lived at home- had come to assume undivided attention...everything was so much easier, and nicer, when Olivia wasn't around.

Hornak writes well-developed characters with their own viewpoints and as a reader it is easy to understand each of their positions. It is also easy to want to smack a few of them, just like in a real family. I liked this book and I think you will, too.