The Worst-Rated Reese's Book Club Pick So Far

We may receive a commission on purchases made from links.

In a world where there are infinite books to read, many people turn to book clubs for guidance. Particularly in the case of celebrity book clubs, there's a certain comfort readers take in trusting established literary communities to lead them to titles that are widely liked. In Reese's Book Club, for example, every pick has over 3 stars on GoodReads. But even among high-quality and popular books, there has to be those on the lower end of the rating scale. The lowest-rated Reese's Book Club title to date, at least as far as Goodreads is concerned, is March 2020's pick, "The Jetsetters" by Amanda Eyre Ward.

It tells the story of Charlotte Perkins, who wins tickets for a 10-day European cruise and brings along her estranged children. An exploration of complicated family dynamics that bring to light buried secrets and important choices, the story's Goodreads blurb compares it to "The Nest" by Cynthia D'Aprix Sweeney and "The Vacationers" by Emma Straub, noting that it's a "delicious and intelligent novel about the courage it takes to reveal our true selves."

Unfortunately, not all readers see it that way; it has earned the relatively lower average of 3.07 stars from more than 57,000 ratings. "Yikes. I usually love (or at least like) a Reese's book club pick ... but this left me absolutely stunned," one reviewer noted on Goodreads, while another called it "pretty terrible" for a club pick: "The writing was stilted, like a child wrote it. The narrator was not good either ... it feels like it was a book about whiney adults who feel bad for themselves." Many reviewers felt shortchanged because the novel was so different from what they were expecting. "I thought it was going to be a light, fluffy, beach read but it was definitely a more heavy read with family drama and some deeper rooted issues," observed one reader. So, how on earth did "The Jetsetters" make it into Reese's Book Club?

It appears "The Jetsetters" isn't exactly the best Reese's Book Club pick of all time, but among the negative reviews of this tome on Goodreads, there are also some positive comments attached to 4 and 5-star ratings. "The Jetsetters delves into what a broken family looks like," one reader explained. "It is funny, yet sensitive and heartbreaking all at the same time. We can all identify with family crisis of some sort. And as we would in our own family, we root for them all, feel their pain and embarrassment, and hope they can put their baggage away and become better people and a new family." Another called it a "sharp and poignant look at a dysfunctional family trying to find their way back to each other," while others found the sense of drama to be captivating and the characters to be likable, even though it's not one of the Reese's Book Club picks that makes for the perfect beach read. Some readers also commented on the humor in the story, with one saying, "I laughed out loud throughout this book, which is rare."

Reese Witherspoon herself noted on Instagram that she loved "the sense of adventure" in "The Jetsetters," calling it a "fun read" for spring break. Meanwhile, author Amanda Eyre Ward has several other novels under her belt, many of them with higher Goodreads ratings, including 2015's "The Same Sky," which received an average of 3.86 stars, and 2004's "How to Be Lost," which has an average of 3.55 stars. Ultimately, while this novel worked for some readers, including Witherspoon and several reviewers on Goodreads, it didn't work for others. It may not leave the legacy of "Eleanor Oliphant Is Completely Fine" by Gail Honeyman, Reese's Book Club's first-ever pick that became an instant favorite. Still, we suspect that this isn't a case of bad writing, but rather different strokes for different folks.