Did You Hear About Kitty Karr?

DNF at 25%. English is not my first language, but I've been reading books in it for almost 10 years and seldomly had any problem with understanding what I read. But I give up this book. Most of the time I was so confused who does what and who says anything. And I don't feel like it would be worth it to try to understand this book.

I enjoyed the book thoroughly, even though the ending fell kind of flat.

Mary and Kitty's story is interesting and their chapters keep your interest. when it came to Elise and her bunch, not so much. I think the lack if care I have for these characters may help a little in my feeling that the ending fell flat for me. I hate when I love a book until the ending.

I'd recommend the book though. it is a good read. a bit predictable at times but I think for people who read a lot that becomes the norm. we are always trying to figure out the plot.

3.75 rounded up.

I found this book interesting. The network that they built to help advance society and support a more fair and integrated society was inspiring and heartbreaking.

The selfishness of the acts to advance the greater good was noble.

I did not enjoy the ending. For all the build up, I found the ending sort of, flat.

I'm drawn to stories about movies/Hollywood (both old and modern day) so I was excited to pick this up, and there was definitely a lot to like here. But mmmmmm I feel like...this would have functioned better as a more straightforward historical fiction without the intergenerational present day aspect? Like most readers are going to pretty quickly gather that Kitty was their secret grandma... so why make it a ~big reveal~ toward the end?

Also I just found Kitty's Old Hollywood storyline much more compelling than the present day St James sisters. Like I understand the parallels being drawn between Kitty needing to pass as White to succeed and Elise needing to delete her Black Lives Matter social media post but also like, IDK, did we need all 3 sisters and and also the publicists and also the boyfriends? A lot going on that didn't necessarily all contribute!

The thing I was maybe most interested in was the concept of the Blair House secret society for Black women passing as white to secretly help each other and help darker skinned women too, and I did some googles to see if that was a real thing and it seems like no? Or if there was...it's still secret? Anyway I would have loved a book that focused more on that and dropped the present day stuff?

Anyway...I'll keep an eye out and see what Crystal Smith Paul writes next because I think there's some good stuff in here but it's maybe a little too much packed into one debut novel?

Just under an actual 4 star.

I think this book would have been excellent if it just got a bit more editing.
Kitty's chapters are far more interesting to the reader and Elise's feel like cardboard in comparison. Additionally, I felt there were some pacing issues and some more explanation to what happened to certain characters would have strengthened the overall effect.

However, Kitty's story is incredibly compelling and worth the read even with the other minor issues.