The story spans over twenty years and how two particular events in Abigail Sorenson's life determined the choices she made as she was entering her adult life. The first was when her brother Robert vanished the day before her 16th birthday. He had been diagnosed with MS, which explained a lot to Abigail, without leaving a note or saying goodbye he simply went out one day and didn't come back. He left a massive hole in her life.
The second was a letter she received in the same year inviting her to have sent to her chapters from a book which encouraged her to take on challenges or learn new skills. The authors claimed it was a guide book to much bigger things. When Abi receives an invite for an all-inclusive trip to finally discover the truth, twenty years after the first chapter had arrived, she accepted.
The story drops back to how life was with her brother and the lengths she went to look for him. She never lost hope or gave up. It follows her through love, loss and having her son.
I loved this unusual story that grew on me more and more with each chapter. New characters were introduced, each unique with their own stories. I don't and won't say anything else except that it greatly affected me. I cried with huge sobs in the last few chapters as it was so moving and I soared and laughed so much as I closed the book. So very truly uplifting in every sense it made me bubbly inside. Pure magic!

A great idea for a novel but I just couldn’t get my head around the writing - not one I could get absorbed in. I am wondering if, had I enjoyed more non-fiction philosophy or self help books, I would have found this more accessible.

Abigail is a single mother to a five year boy called Oliver, and has had a series of sad times in her life.
Her brother disappeared years before, she discovered her husband was unfaithful and they divorced. During all this time Abi has mysteriously received chapters from what seems to be a guide book on how to fly. So after receiving the chapters during those years she receives an invitation to attend a retreat to hear the truth about the guidebook she leaves her son and off she goes.
Gravity is the thing is a novel about finding your way in life, moving on from grief, sadness, daily battles and failed marriages.
From the beginning as a reader I could not get the gist of this book its a slow start and I couldn't connect with the characters. Bur the last third of the book everything connected and I loved that the mystery was solved.
I did feel that the story stalled in places and there were some repetition. But overall interesting, thought provoking and how to get through life.

I admit I am in the minority here, so don't just trust my impressions of this novel, but I spent most of this wondering when it was going to pick up the pace. It's safe to say that despite being over 400 pages long, not a lot happens here. You start off quite strongly with an intriguing invitation to a retreat weekend, apparently set up by the writers of The Guidebook, a life manual of sorts that Abigail has been receiving chapters of in the mail for twenty years. You get a blast of whimsy at learning that the retreat is all about learning the power of flight. But from there it fizzles out into the mundane and the repetitive.

There are some sweet moment; Abigail and her five year old sons interactions and dialogue, for example. Oscar is a beautifully written child and the author has managed to capture the idiosyncrasies and whimsy of the young child, their thought processes and how they can be sweet, funny and annoying all at the same time! The mystery of what happened to her fifteen year old brother is interesting, but doesn't really become a main plot point until the end. It's also abruptly and strangely wrapped up, with what is in reality a rather ludicrous series of events. The character portrayals are done well as a whole, it's just a pity they just seem to be meandering through life, rather than doing anything interesting.

Once the intrigue of the retreat is over however I was, quite frankly, bored. It's a pity because the writing style is engaging, it's just there is so much meandering around doing nothing much. Abigail reads a lot of self help books and you get her thoughts on each and every one as well as examples of her putting each one into action. Most of these personally felt wishy washy and rather useless - only ask the universe for good things, you bring misfortune on yourself by focussing on the worst that could happen. Likewise, the Guidebook itself was given to you in snippets throughout and I found myself skipping over them in order to get to something substantial. You then get a load of 'Flight Classes'and again, it felt like waffle and repetitive waffle at that.

It's also worth noting that the structure of this was more confusing than anything else. Split into a dual timeline, there is little to immediately differentiate the difference between past and present. The sections for the past are done via a 'stream of consciousness' first person narrative as an analysis of the year... but so is the present narrative to a point. I was often three or more paragraphs in before I realised that we had jumped timelines. On top of that, both narratives often felt rather choppy, although this was most notable in the stream of consciousness. It also felt rambling at times, pointless even. After all, who cares about a random boyfriend she had sex with and split up with twenty odd years ago? Certainly not me.

So overall, this just wasn't for me. Maybe it's the genre as much as anything; it's not quite chicklit, but it's close enough. That isn't what I was expecting when I requested it and it's not a genre I have any interest in. But whilst I found the last handful of pages touching, it doesn't make up for the fact that I was having to actively remind myself to pick this up and read a handful more pages. I think if the focus was centred more on the disappearance and search for the brother, it would have engaged me more. As it stands, it was a long, slow and ultimately tedious read that was brightened by sparks of brilliance.

Thanks to NetGalley and the publisher for my free ARC of this novel.

This book took me longer to read than usual, the reason being that it wasn't just one book ..it felt like an amalgamation of every self help book/philosophy/theology/mystery/diary and love story ! Initially I felt like the author had eavesdropped on the private conversations that go on in my head -thank God I'm not the only one who has a running narrative going on in their brain ! I really don't know how to categorise this book. All I can say it it's a journey but a journey worth taking. Intriguing, tantalising, immersing and ultimately very satisfying .

Hmmm… There's certainly a good premise in this – a seemingly random subscription to a guidebook delivered in monthly piecemeal parts seems to connect our narrator with everyone else at an island retreat – but… I think there might be a good 200 page novel to make from it, but our author has chosen to make it 500pp, partly to disguise what the book is really about, but mostly because she loves the sound of her own voice. From the get-go here I was forced to accept the narration trying so hard to be funny – or in fact telling me that it had just made a joke when it plainly hadn't. I can't imagine anybody would warm to a book that alleges it's being comical so often and so incorrectly. And when people in a flashback discuss something that we've just read but has yet to actually happen, I wonder if the author had ever warmed to things enough to actually read it back herself.

I read #GravityIsTheThing not really knowing what to expect. It is certainly very different.
As a teenager Abi started receiving chapters of a self-help book in the post.. Now a single parent with a little boy, this is her touching story. The novel provides information from her history, mixed with her current dilemmas and life. She is likeable and funny. I related to her frustrations, dreams and wishes and I think a lot of other people will too.
I enjoyed the book, and I am glad I persevered after a slow and slightly quirky start.
Thank you tit he author, publisher and #NetGalley for the opportunity to read and review this book.

Just could not get in to this book really not my cup of tea gave up after I kept putting it down & didnt really want to return to it.

I mustn't be a member of the targeted audience for this book as I really disliked it. From the start, the narrator's voice jarred with me and I found the conversational style quite irritating. I didn't find the little jokes and asides at all funny and at one point wondered whether the author was trying to suggest she was somewhere on the autistic spectrum. My lack of empathy with Abigail meant I was never really engaged withe story and the initial premise seemed to stretch the imagination to its limits.

I never like panning a book but this one really tested my patience.

There is lots to like about this book and I’m sure it will appeal to many people but I’m sorry, I couldn’t get on with the writing style so am putting it aside for now. It’s different, fresh and funny but maybe I’m too old or it’s just not what I feel like reading at the moment. I may return to it though!

I received an ARC copy of this book via net galley and Atlantic books in exchange for an honest review. As I write this I am unsure how i really feel about the book or indeed, how to define it. Abigail has had her share of sorrows in life but she is running her own cafe whilst bringing her child up on her own when she receives an invite to the final part of a "self-hep" correspondence course. Only this time she isn't corresponding but attending a retreat. There are parts of this book which really sing with emotion, bring the characters alive and can even reduce the reader to tears. However there is also a lot which appears to go nowhere and seems only to extend the narrative. There were times when i was pinned to the narrative and others where i wanted to put it down. Overall I am going to go on the side of having enjoyed the book but not loved it I would however try more from this author

This is a strange book written for adults by someone who normally writes for children. The central character is Abigail Sorensen, in her mid-30s with a four year old son and a job running what is called the Happiness Café. Finding happiness is a key theme in the novel especially because Abigail's brother disappeared after a diagnosis of multiple sclerosis while she was in her teens with the family left with no idea where he had gone or what had happened. Just before this happened she started receiving unsolicited mail about something called the Guidebook, a free self-help book with chapters arriving at regular intervals. When the story starts, in 2010, Abigail has accepted an invitation to find out more at an island retreat.

There she meets Wilbur and a group of people who are going to shape her life. They become what they label a flying club because one of its key beliefs is that anyone can fly - riding invisible waves - as long as they believe!

The story then flips back to 1990 and Abigail's teens covering her adolescent friendships and experiments as well as her brother Robert's disappearance. Back in the present, Abigail starts exploring self-help solutions in between attending flying club meetings. So, there is a bit of commentary on the Celestine Prophecy, Parent-Adult-Child analysis and so on while flying club seems to do a lot of yoga and Abigail tries to find a man.

Then we flip back to 2000 when Abigail gets involved with Finn - a harmless man without great depths. It doesn't last but on the rebound she gets pregnant. You have to be fairly tolerant of how the book meanders around this time scale, flipping backwards and forwards and learning about flight in all sorts of aspects, having an on-off relationship with another man with a few more bits of self-help thrown in for good measure.

After more adventures, it turns out that Robert drowned in a Norwegian lake fairly soon after leaving home so that chapter is closed. The relationship with the temporary man fizzles out, flying club stops and, ultimately, Abigail finds some kind of happiness with its teacher, Wilbur.

So it's a strange book, a sort of wander really, but also an insight into a life half lived. It's easy to warm to Abigail even if sometimes you think she does some daft things. There's a lot of self-help but no answers and you might enjoy the ride.

Weird, quirky, odd, and any other synonym you can think of for just straight up bizarre. This is a book that is almost impossible to review without sharing spoilers, so please don't read on if you haven't read the book yet!

Ok, so we start with Abi attending a retreat, organised by the creators of the Guidebook - a self help book that Abi has been receiving chapters of through the post for the last 20 years. Some think it's a cult, some think it's a pyramid scheme, but to Abi, the Guidebook has always felt inexplicably linked to the disappearance of her brother Robert at the age of 15, shortly after he was diagnosed with MS. And finally, it looks like all is about to be revealed, as the retreat promises to finally tell the truth behind the guidebook.

And the truth is... they can fly! We can all fly! Well, we're meant to fly, but we all gradually stopped teaching our kids to fly, so now we as a species have forgot. So, the purpose of the guidebook is a 20 year old introduction on how to fly. Now, the whole way through I assumed this was some sort of mumbo jumbo metaphor, but it's not - the book genuinely ends with them flying. So there's that. And Robert's disappearance? He does a runner to the North Pole to try and cure his MS, but fell through the ice and drowned on his first day there, but as he'd nicked his neighbours passport there was no record of who he actually was, so the body went unidentified. So, not the happy ending you're expecting on that front.

The narrative of this book is just honestly completely bizarre. It's sort of like a stream of consciousness, tracking Abi's thoughts in a very unusual way - it sort of jumps about from topic to topic like a bee buzzing between flowers at an alarming speed. I've never read anything by Moriarty, so I have no idea if this is normal for her writing, but it definitely took a while to get used to, and at times I did find myself skipping sections.

I'm a big fan of magical realism, but for me, this just didn't work. It felt unfinished, unedited, and to be frank just ridiculous. I so wanted to love it, but sadly it was a miss for me.

I love Abi and can identify with her and her problems and worries. Abi has suffered a great loss and can’t rest until she discovers the truth. With the help of a mysterious friend Abi is helped to cope with life and maybe just find a new way and exciting way to cope with life. Readers will be enthralled with her story. This is a nice, friendly story of love, loss and fantasy that is like a warm blanket.

I liked the premise of this book where the main character receives a chapter of a book during her teenage years. 20 years later she is invited to find out what the book is about. This is when the story lost me!

I found it very hard to continue and I did as I was intrigued to how it would end. This story was not for me.

Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for the opportunity to read this advance copy in exchange for a honest review.

I have to admit, I'm biased to like Jaclyn Moriarty. Her Ashbury/Brookfield books are some of my favourites, and I remain bewildered and incensed by the fact that it's seemingly not possible to obtain a copy of the third Colours of Madeleine book in the UK. At all. Trust me, I've tried. So when I saw Gravity Is The Thing on NetGalley, of course I was going to request it! I've seen it described as bestselling YA author Moriarty's adult debut, but I actually think that's incorrect - I Have a Bed Made of Buttermilk Pancakes was originally written for adults, then repackaged as The Spellbook of Listen Taylor (the version I read) with a YA focus. Not having read the original, I'm not sure how different they are, but that's all prevarication, I suppose.

Frankly, I loved this book. Moriarty's trademark wit and lightness, as well as her whimsical descriptions, are as present here as in the YA books I've so thoroughly enjoyed. But writing for adults, Moriarty inserts an extra depth and nuance that gives this book an oomph which makes it compelling and lingering in style. Abigail Sorensen, our main character, gives us an unfiltered stream of consciousness as she begins her trip to flight school with a weekend retreat. The everyday mundanity of parenting her four-year-old, Oscar, combines with the trials and tribulations of both flight school and embarking upon her first romantic encounters since the breakup of her marriage five(-ish) years previously. Underlying this is the mystery of the disappearance of Abigail's brother fifteen years earlier, and the Guidebook which has been Abigail's companion throughout her life ever since. They must be related - finding out more about the guidebook will lead Abi to find out more about Robert, right?

These seemingly disparate threads of Abigail's life are skillfully interwoven, and over the course of a year, we delve deeply into Abigail's past, her present - and to a lesser extent her future. I'm generally not a fan of magical realism books, finding them too uncertain and too close to reality to really enjoy them. So this book, which skates on the fine line between reality and wonder, was one I would generally be predisposed to dislike. But I can't dislike Jaclyn Moriarty. Her deft touch, her wonderful characterisation, her hilarious yet so everyday depiction of childhood - all of these things come together to create an experience which is truly moving, threaded through with the realities of life and the everyday wonder of it. An absolutely beautiful book.

I am so glad that I persevered with this book. I found it hard to get into. In places it is thought provoking. It talks about coping with love and loss. Abigail has suffered loss and heartbreak in her life. The Guidebook chapters and the events that follow will change her life. Some of the characters were really interesting and there were a few that I disliked. The more I got into this book the better it became. It feels in parts like a self help book. I will definitely be thinking about this story for a while.

Thank you to Netgalley for my copy.

Sadly not my sort of book. I really wanted to enjoy it and kept reading it hoping that it would get better, but it didn’t and I didn’t like the writing style either.

I have to say I really found this book confusing at times
I read to the end to see if it made any more sense than at the beginning but sadly I still struggled
I understood the story of Abi underneath all the flowery writing and her story was interesting unfortunately I am not a fan of the rest of the writing

Struggled to get through this book,there is a story there but under many layers. The main character is a bit of a flibbertyjibbet,moving from one self help theory to another before finding herself,mybe.