Review: Madeline McKnight Signs Off: A Novel

Madeline McKnight Signs Off: A Novel by Evan Brooke
My rating: 2 of 5 stars

On a side note, thank you to Goodreads for finally allowing us half stars!

This is a very difficult book to describe, and if you pick it up, be prepared to scratch your head in confusion for most of the book. You are going to hate the characters as I did (except for the dog and Lee), or you are going to love them. You are either going to love or hate the formatting, and the same goes for the font -sometimes normal and sometimes (for certain aspects of the book) tiny. Thank goodness for Kindle, so I could change the sizes so I could read the tiny print.

A quick description of this book: it mostly follows Madeline McKnight in her last months as she dies of cancer, and her obsession with Hetty Green, also known as the "Witch of Wall Street," who died the richest woman in America. Madeline was described as "The Bitch of Wall Street" at one time.

Madeline had made a mess of her life after one *ahem* small mistake. She made an enemy of her best friend, became a laughingstock at work, and was an altogether vindictive witch.

Also, you need to know a lot about fly fishing, or at least want to learn about it, since it takes up a lot of this book... well, actually, so do the bits about Hetty James.

This book kept me interested enough to finish, but not enough that I would recommend it with a broad brush.

*ARC supplied by the publisher Atria Books/Simon & Schuster Publishing, the author, and ATTL/Edelweiss.

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SUMMARY: "“An extraordinary exploration of friendship that spans the broadest universal themes of love and loyalty to the most intricate, intimate, and memorable details of a human life.” —Jill McCorkle, New York Times bestselling author

An unconventional relationship between women of two different generations becomes something transcendent in this vulnerable, heartbreaking, and life-affirming debut novel that proves it’s never too late to come of age.

Madeline McKnight is writing her final annual report. A former Wall Street power player, she uses a pie chart to rank her most hated rivals, a line graph to follow the trajectory of her net worth and reputation, and even a formula to predict when the metastasized cancer will kill her. But there’s no equation to predict the likelihood that Bri Davis, Madeline’s estranged best friend’s daughter, will agree to take care of her at the end of her life.

Bri is a nursing student fresh off a breakup, ambivalent about her future, and drowning in debt. She agrees to Madeline’s strange proposal, mostly for the obscene payday. Sharp as knives and intimidatingly smart, Bri finds herself face-to-face with a force of nature rather than an ailing patient. Madeline ropes Bri into the bigger plans she has afoot for her final act. Madeline McKnight has never gone away quietly and she doesn’t plan to start now.

As this unlikely pair teams up to tackle Madeline’s final days can they trade her badwill for goodwill before it’s too late?"