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There are currently 18 member reviews
for The Seven O'Clock Club
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Dorothy S. (Carrollton, TX)
Good Grief!
Four strangers, each grieving a loss, are brought together for an experiment conducted by an aspiring young therapist. Each Tuesday at seven o'clock the proverbial onion layers are peeled back to reveal the situations that brought the four together. The therapist begins by asking each wary client to hearken back to a happy childhood memory. Through weekly conversations and outside interactions, bonds are slowly built, showing the power of sharing, trust, and speaking the truth aloud. The revelations are spellbinding, heart wrenching, and believable, making for anxious reader moments awaiting the next meeting. Startling discoveries lead to an unsettling, thought-provoking ending.
The Seven O'Clock Club is a scientific rather than spiritual approach to grief. Unpacking feelings of guilt, learning to trust, seeking forgiveness, and finding truth, are themes in this soul-searching journey through grief.
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Kathryn H. (Rochester, MI)
The Weight of Grief
If you're looking for a book with car chases, explosions, and double agents, you're not looking for "The Seven O'Clock Club." If you'd feel at home with a book about four strangers who have each endured a tragedy from which they can't seem to heal, Amelia Ireland has written the perfect story for you.
Genevieve is a therapist who has developed a technique to help people get back to wholeness and functioning. Freya, Mischa, Victoria, and Callum are the suffering souls invited to join this group. If they accept, they commit to at least four sessions.
It isn't easy. At the first meeting, Genevieve asks everyone to recount a happy experience from their childhood. It's heart-wrenching how difficult this is for some.
Then the twist comes-- one of the biggest I've encountered in a novel. The conclusions I'd reached no longer made sense. The story became all the more compelling and I read chapter after chapter to learn what might happen to these characters.
"The Seven O'Clock Club" is Amelia Ireland's first novel. It is so well written that the characters seem to jump off the page. I strongly recommend it.
Thank you to BookBrowse for allowing me to read this book. This is my honest review.
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Charlene M. (Myrtle Beach, SC)
The Seven o'clock Club
I am blown away that this is Amelia Ireland's debut novel. It is a fascinating look into grief & how each individual character handled it. Ms Ireland inspired me to think about my own experience of losing a husband & the sensation I felt when he died. I highly recommend this book. And look forward to her next novel.
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Susan B. (Fort Myers, FL)
Refreshing, inspirational, pageturner
Grief, not the easiest of topics, comes full circle in this book. Well written, four people in the depths of grief, each with a heart catching story, come together with a therapist who has sought them out to work thru their pain. Little by little we come to know each of the four, their lives, loves, worries, and pain. The author discloses it bit by bit and I was left wanting more after each chapter. The ending was a surprise, one I will not disclose, but worth the entire read. I found it really was a book I could not putdown.
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Marie W. (Prescott, AZ)
A Fantastic Tale
The characters in this story are English. Five strangers, four members of a group plus their leader, come together with the stated purpose of dealing with loss and grief. As they speak about their lives, they struggle with guilt, sadness, anger, love, etc., and new truths and connections come to light.
This book truly keeps the reader guessing. From the beginning, the author hints that there is more to her story than meets the eye.
There is some magical realism here, the kind that gave this reader something to fantasize about: what if all of this were real? (As a therapist who has led many bereavement groups, I'd like to ask the group leader some questions myself!)
Each chapter is narrated by one of the group members as he/she participates in the group. Thus we come to know and care about them as individuals.
I recommend this book for its creativity, humor, and warmth. I enjoyed it, and believe it would provide book groups with much material for a lively discussion!
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Sharon J. (Raleigh, NC)
The Seven O'Clock Club
I really enjoyed the initial part of The Seven O'Clock Club where the story focused on four strangers who, working with a grief counselor, slowly and with heartfelt support of each other come to heal their own hearts. The characters were well developed as were the friendships and even a bit of romance. But I found the plot twist, which came toward the end and without any foreshadowing to be quite a leap. Maybe if hints had been woven in, beyond the introduction, I would have been able to make this leap. I do like how Ireland writes and will read another when available.
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Helen B. (WINTHROP, ME)
The Seven O'Clock Club
Grief is the strongest of emotions; it can hold people back, but it can, under the right circumstances,help a person become a stronger, kinder human. Amelia Ireland's debut novel, The Seven O'Clock Club, explores what happens when four people, who can't seem to move on from their different tragic circumstances, are brought together in one therapy group. Ireland is deft with character creation. They are flawed, but you root for them, even in their worst moments. However, this is more than a story about the power of the human spirit or the usefulness of therapy, it gives a gift of hope, when near the end, truths are revealed and decisions are made. I was quickly turning the pages as I came to care deeply about each character. It does stall a bit in the last chapters, but it makes up for it in the epilogue. An excellent novel for those dealing with the challenge of letting go.
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