Helga without the H

Three star review, originally posted here on September 25th, 2025

This is a good book to read 2 days before your period starts. That is, if you are like me and find yourself crying at cheesy commercials, wondering WTF is wrong with you and why is every cheesy thing tearing you to bits, then realizing, oh, it means The Big Drop is coming soon. Gotcha. When I realize this, if I’m at home, I just let the tears flow! Gimme all the cheesiness! I want to FEEL the FEELINGS!

But in this case, I was reading the end of this book on a crowded metro train on my way to work, and had to work hard to not sob. The faces I was making must have been nuts. So less ideal timing.

That was just the last day of reading, though. Before that, I found this book mostly meh. Like, it was fine, I guess. And there was plenty of stuff to like.

the #1 thing to know about this book is that it is hella cheesy. If you put into ChatGPT “Please right me a touching coming-of-age tale in a rural old-timey setting. Have some orphans a a dog. And a single black character who our white protagonists defend to prove they’re anti-racism. Do something kinda like To Kill a Mockingbird or Fried Green Tomatoes or Anne of Green Gables, with a spunky tomboy protagonist. Let’s throw in a courtroom scene with a big ‘gotcha!” moment. Oh, and definitely make sure we hero-worship the characters who are writers,” well, this is the book that would come out. If this sounds like something you’d be into, then great, you’ll love this book.

That all sounded great to me when I picked up this book. Yeah, I definitely wanted a cheesy heartwarming story like the one outlined above. The problem is, everything was just a bit too forced, resulting in the entire work falling flat. This book felt like it was trying SO HARD to be the Virginia version of To Kill a Mockingbird, but it was missing all of the nuance. Every character was one-dimensional: the good guys were too obviously good, the bad guys were too cartoonishly evil. The tragedies befalling our characters just Kept. Piling. Up. Sooooo many tragedies! Remember how Bridge to Terabithia had ONE tragedy? Well, this book was like, “Okay let’s do that, but turn it up to 11! Everyone dies! That’ll make ’em cry!”

I was also really creeped out by one of the characters, the Atticus Finch of our tale. He’s a lawyer with a heart of gold! He even has a kinda weird name (that I actually liked): Cotton Longfellow. Sounds great, right? Except he’s got a weird obsession with our protagonist’s deceased father ,and author. Longfellow is from Boston but moves to Virginia because he read books by the author describing the region. He wants to be an author just like this guy, writing books about this place just like this guy. He befriends his obsession’s grandmother. When his obsession dies and the rest of the family moves to Virginia, Longfellow swoops in to try to take his obsession’s place in the family. He spends HOURS with the guy’s comatose wife, talking at her when she has no way of escaping him. He offers to adopt the guy’s kids. It’s SO WEIRD. But I think we’re supposed to like him? (Also, I’m guessing Baldacci sees himself in the Longfellow character- a lawyer and aspiring writer? What’s not to love?!)

That reminds me- I have a personal pet peeve; I typically hate stories about writers. Especially writers with writer’s block. And this book has THREE writers in it! FOUR if you include the mom’s brilliant letters. Ugh. So that knocks things down a bit for me, but probably won’t bother you (or maybe it will- I have no idea who you or why you’re reading my ramblings.)

All that being said, I didn’t hate this book. It was fine! And there was plenty to like. As a native Virginia with a particular fondness for our mountains, I appreciated the setting. This book is like a PG-rated Demon Copperhead! All the love for the region, but 100% less meth! I especially liked the storylines about the big bad industries (timber, coal, and now gas) wreaking havoc on the communities by making big economic promises but then bouncing. More people have to realize that this is how corporations operate, and how they have historically fucked up Appalachia in this manner. So I very much appreciated Baldacci bringing that issue into the light.

I also appreciate that, according to the intro, Baldacci based this book largely on his own grandmother’s life. If this was really her life, well, then I think this is really special. There’s no way he didn’t add some embellishments to the storyline, but the characters, though one-dimensional, were still lovely. Louisa-May, the tough-as-nails but of-so-loving mountain granny, was particularly awesome.

I also specifically sought out this book because I felt like reading some super cheesy coming-of-age tale, so that was also great. It’s the book equivalent of a Hallmark movie. Sometimes you just wanna lay under a blanket with some hot chocolate and read about orphans on a farm and cry a little. So this book scratches that itch to a certain degree.