You Cannot Mess This Up: A True Story That Never Happened

by Amy Weinland Daughters

It's 2014 and Amy Daughters is a forty-six-year old stay-at-home mom living in Dayton, Ohio. She returns to her hometown of Houston over the Thanksgiving holiday to discuss her parents’ estate—and finds herself hurled back in time. Suddenly, it’s 1978, and she is forced to spend thirty-six hours in her childhood home with her nuclear family, including her ten-year old self. Over the next day and a half she reconsiders every feeling she’s ever had, discusses current events with dead people, gets overserved at a party with her parent’s friends, and is treated to lunch at the Bonanza Sirloin Pit. Besides noticing that everyone is smoking cigarettes, she’s still jealous of her sister, and there is a serious lack of tampons in the house, Amy also begins to appreciate that memories are malleable, wholly dependent on who is doing the remembering. In viewing her parents as peers and her siblings as detached children, she redefines her difficult relationships with her family members and, ultimately, realizes that her life story matters and is profoundly significant—not so much to everyone else, perhaps, but certainly to her. Amy’s guide said her trip back in time wouldn’t change anything in the future, but by the time her thirty-six hours are up, she’s convinced that she’ll never be the same again.

Genres: Fiction, Historical Fiction, Time Travel, Book Club, Womens Fiction, Adult Fiction

352 pages, Paperback

Published June 4, 2019

Reviews

[Cindy Burnett (Thoughts from a Page) · Rating 5 out of 5]

Amy Weinland Daughters has hit it out of the ballpark with her debut novel. Thought-provoking, clever, and highly personal, YOU CANNOT MESS THIS UP will keep readers entertained from beginning to end. The time period, the 1970’s, will be an added bonus for those who lived through it originally – the references, the lack of cell phones, and the general way of life are so accurately and often hilariously depicted. While I highly recommend this book for anyone and everyone, those individuals with strained familial relationships and dynamics will truly benefit from and take comfort in Daughters’ tale. Do not miss this one!

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[Susan · Rating 4 out of 5]

I loved the premise of this story. It’s 2014 and Amy Daughters is 46, married and has two sons when she flies to TX ahead of her immediate family for a meeting with her dad and siblings regarding her parents’ estate. She experiences a time blip however and ends up in 1978 at her childhood home in Houston with her mom and dad, older sister Kimber and younger brother Rick and most weird of all…her 10 year old self! Amy pretends she is a distant cousin from Ohio and spends Thanksgiving and part of the next day observing her family and herself as a 10 year old. Although the family seems pretty perfect to the casual observer, Big Amy can’t help but recognize the dysfunction underneath all the polyester pantsuits!
I was 12 years old in 1978 and enjoyed all the nostalgic references. The author did a great job of bringing that time period to life as she described the clothes, music, decor and lifestyles of the 70s. It was fun to take that walk down memory lane and compare it to my own memories of my childhood in Texas.
Big Amy uses the time to examine herself at age 10, the awkwardness she often felt, and her relationship with her mother and other members of her family. She compares the memories from her childhood with what she is actually seeing played out in front of her. Why did she remember things the way she did? Why did she feel like her mother loved her but perhaps never liked her? Why was she such a freaky adolescent? Did she feel accepted as a child? Did she even notice what was going on around her? Big Amy tries to understand her adult self in a new light as she watches the family dynamics of her past. Although the story is fictional the author states in the epilogue that
“Though the journey detailed in the pages of this book didn’t happen in real life, the impact of writing it was, for me, nothing short of life changing.” I appreciated this because she wrote the book as a way to address her inner feelings from her childhood. It freed her to talk with her mom about their relationship and find some peace going forward. I found the introspection very real and relateable.
I did feel the story moved a bit slowly and I wished the author had been more forthcoming with some of the details of her childhood. She was VERY awkward and her parents described her as difficult. Why? She hinted at some hard handed discipline by her mother. She hinted at alcoholism. She tried to take her own life, but again the details were vague. I wish she had just filled in the blanks a bit more. I also struggled to reconcile how odd she was as a child with the fully functioning adult she had become.
I think anyone growing up during the 70s might enjoy this book, as would adults trying to reconcile childhood hurts in present day.
Finally I loved the cover photo! It reminded me of my 10 year old self with my crooked pony tails! The cover is what initially drew me to read the book! Cover art is so important as a first introduction to a novel.
Thank you NetGalley and the publisher for the opportunity to read this book. This review is my honest opinion.

[Ally Copper · Rating 3 out of 5]

I absolutely loved the concept of this book. It was magical and had a lot of potential to take a very specific story about a very specific family and tell some truths that are universal. At times, it did that. At other times, this book suffered for want of one or two more final edits. Daughters' one fatal flaw in this book was not trusting her readers. She spent a lot of time showing us in exquisite, delightful detail the world her main character had entered, but she spent altogether too much time TELLING us over and over and over what it all means, or better yet, what it *might* mean. The words "perhaps" and "maybe" were way overused to the point that I just completely lost interest. I wish she would have trusted her readers a little more to carry away from this zany story the messages that we gleaned instead of thinking she had to show us every possible lesson we could possibly take away. The truth is, though, that I had fun with this book. The parts of it that were good were really, really good. I just wish some of the talky, philosophizing fog could have been cleared away to leave us with that crisp, clear picture of the main part of the story. I do look forward to what Amy Weinland Daughters brings us next.

[Mary Barr · Rating 5 out of 5]

I’m so fortunate to be one of the first to have read Amy’s book, “You Cannot Mess This Up”. I’ve known Amy for years and I count her as one of my very best friends. So, knowing Amy, I expected the book to be hilarious. I expected it to have crazy strong details about the clothes, people, and home furnishings of the 70’s. Her descriptive game is strong. What I didn’t expect was a look PAST the funny, crazy Amy that everyone knows and loves, to the vulnerable and introspective Amy that not many do. There are so many funny parts to this book, but there are also some really serious, soul searching moments. Her writing is excellent and she left me wanting the NEXT chapter. So proud of you, Amy!!!

[Stephanie Fitzgerald · Rating 3 out of 5]

3.5 stars
What if:
You were a rather jaded adult woman, in your late 30’s, and had a chance to go back in time to meet your ten-year-old self and your family? This is what happens to Amy; she travels back to Thanksgiving 1978 and gets to interact with everyone as they were when she was a kid, even her kid-self (whom she finds rather goofy and hyperactive)! Experiencing her relatives, and herself, as an adult, provides Amy with some shocking revelations about the adult she grew up to be, and about how capricious memories are.
Best part of this book was all the 70’s nostalgia! Eating at Bonanza, bell-bottoms and platform shoes, Saturday morning cartoons with bowls of sugary cereal, etc.; so many memories, because I was born in ‘69!

[Stacy · Rating 3 out of 5]

This book was fun and well written. However, a clear picture was not given to the reader the purpose of the main characters reason for going back in time. Why? Any input from readers of this book is welcomed!

[Michelle · Rating 5 out of 5]

I moved to the area in which this story takes place, in the early 80’s so the references were familiar. I pictured the streets, the home, the stores and read the story with the author’s own voice in my head so I cannot attest to what one unfamiliar with the author or area would experience but I loved it and suspect others would, too. While reading this story, I enjoyed a parallel journey back to my own family, my old neighborhood, home furnishings and games played with my siblings, alongside the author’s remembrances. Although our stories were different, I found her insight to be just as applicable to me. This story was very poignant and beautiful; I laughed and I cried, hallmarks of a great book by my own criteria.

[Sarah · Rating 2 out of 5]

This had such an intriguing premise, but the execution and writing style were not at all my jam.
Why does Big Amy regard her younger self, and frankly, her current self, with so much disdain? She uses terms like "total freak" all the time, but the ten year old described just seems like an enthusiastic and excitable kid. About her 2014 self, she kept making comments along the lines of "as usual, I did everything wrong". I wanted Amy to arrive back in the present, grab that smart phone, and immediately make an appointment with a therapist.

[Lorna · Rating 5 out of 5]

Wow. I loved this! The concept is amazing. To be plunked down in your childhood home on Thanksgiving Day 1978 and have to "re-live" your life there for 36 hours as they happen. Amy was emotional seeing her parents again, and they were still living in 2014 (the book's "present" day). I welled up just imagining seeing my parents again at all and then to see them as their younger selves! And seeing YOURSELF as your younger self!!

As the day passes she remembers some of the goings on as they happen, other times she seemed not to recognize things. But as I thought about it, I certainly can't recall much of my childhood, and certainly not some mundane, everyday moment. It probably wouldn't ring a bell even if I lived it again.

I loved how she compared life and her hometown from 1978 and 2014. Things definitely were different then. Some better, some worse.

So many beautiful insights into family relationships and growing up. I may buy a copy so I can read it again and mark the things that really spoke to me.

The only quibbles I have with the book are 1) adhesive maxi pads were a thing in 78. I got my period in 75, I think, and I never used a belted pad. and 2) stop with the Cincinnati chili hate - it's the best! :)

[Ms. Yingling · Rating 3 out of 5]

Personal copy

Bought this on the recommendation of the Pop Culture Preservation Society.

I loved the time travel premise of this, and the description of the setting and details of everyday life in 1978 were absolutely superb. Took me right back.

Also appreciated that the main character, Amy, was fairly happy with her own life, and when she arrived in 1978, saw that she had always had a decent relationship with her siblings and parents, even if there were things that annoyed her about them from time to time. The fact that the siblings and the father were going over estate issues so that they would be prepared for the death of the parents was a good thing; too many people don't do this.

The purpose for Amy's visit was a little confusing, and I didn't feel like there was a satisfying ending. Was the mother an alcoholic? Was Amy? Did they ever get help? Why exactly was young Amy so... inappropriately exuberant? When did she calm down? There was also a lot of unnecessary mentions of sex, and a disturbing sexual assault, none of which really were worked through. This felt like it would have benefitted from better editing.

Worth reading if only for the mention of the gold initial in the bottom corner of the enormous 1970s eyeglasses; one of those things that I know I had, but of which there is no evidence!

[Debby · Rating 4 out of 5]

You Cannot Mess This Up: A True Story That Never Happened is a terrific novel by Amy Weinland Daughters.

Our main character finds herself thrown back in time to 1978 at Thanksgiving at her parents house, when she, minutes before had been there in 2014 to settle their estate. She has to spend time with them as her 10 year old self. During the time she is there (36 hours) she re-examines herself, her relationship with her family, and basically everything about her life.

As I was 11 at Thanksgiving 1978, I related to this book so very much, down to the trip to Bonanza! I laughed and I cried at Ms. Weinland Daughter's story. I've lost both of my parents within the past few years and think that this would be such a gift, even if it may not have felt like it at the time.

I can't wait to recommend this to my book club when it comes out.

4.5 stars

I was given this book as an ARC by NetGalley and the publisher. All opinions are my own.

[Kristi · Rating 5 out of 5]

I loved this book so much. There are so many things I would love to go back and tell my younger self ... so many things for her to do differently. I would like her to know she is okay the way she is. This book is thought-provoking. Would I have been able to change the direction of my life?

[Kathy · Rating 5 out of 5]

If you could travel back in time and not only observe but interact with your ten-year-old self and your then family, would you? Amy Weinland Daughters imagines herself doing just that, and the result is a fictionalized account of how as a forty-six-year-old adult Amy confronts her memories head-on. The very person she grew up to be, the wife and mother she became had their roots in the feelings and evaluations of her place in her family. Her relationships with her father and mother and siblings sprung from her perceptions of this family life. Would her perceptions be validated, or would they be turned upside down by a visit to her childhood? What would Amy learn about there being more than one side to a story? Is the title of the book accurate, that she cannot mess this up?

Amy's trip back to 1978, from 2014, begins as an innocuous flight from Centreville, Ohio to Houston, Texas. Her husband Willie’s boss is married to a small plane pilot, who offers to let Amy tag along on a flight, as they are both going to Houston at the same time. Amy needs to get there a day ahead of her husband and sons, who will arrive on Thanksgiving Day, to attend a financial meeting with her father, Dick, and her siblings, Jen and Rick. Amy is the proverbial middle child of this family. Falling asleep shortly after take-off, Amy wakes up to find quite a shocking turn of events. She and Mary are wearing different clothes, and by different, I mean clothes from another time. Here’s the description of Amy’s new attire:
“My skinny jeans, boots, and sweater had morphed into some snug-fitting plaid pants. The color combo was mesmerizing—a blaring yellow-gold background, like the harvest-gold refrigerator my mom had in the ‘70s—offset with a brown check and narrow white gridlines. It was as if a roll of Scotch tape had exploded on my legs. Then there was a turtleneck sweater, ribbed, I suppose, for my pleasure. It was the same yellow-gold as the pant. It was seriously tight and for some unknown reason had a zipper at the back neck opening. I couldn’t see it, but I could definitely feel it.”

Mary explains the bizarre turn of events. Amy is going to spend Thanksgiving Day 1978, which is apparently today, and the next day until 5:00 p.m. with her family of 1978, in their home of 1978, and that includes her ten-year-old self. The cover story is that she is a writer, which is true, and she has come to meet with someone in Houston about her writing. She is unable to make her returning connection to her home in Ohio and is thus going to be spending Thanksgiving with her cousin Dick, really Amy’s father, and his family. Apparently, Dick is going to buy this story.

Amy is in flash-back heaven as Mary drives her through the trendy subdivision of her 1978 childhood. It was nothing short of idyllic. When they arrive at Amy’s past home and family, she approaches it with much trepidation. Will this actually work? Will she be able to fake it and not slip up with her 2014 world spilling out? She seems to be the only one ill at ease with the task. Her 1978 family is welcoming, and Little Amy (present Amy becomes Big Amy, as she keeps her name) is an exuberant greeter indeed. Big Amy thinks maybe Little Amy is acting like a bit of a freak, but that’s not a complete surprise. Shown to her room, the only room on the third floor but conveniently with a bathroom, Amy unpacks her suitcase and realizes that everything in it is 1978 appropriate, even the make-up and sanitary napkins.

It’s easier than Amy feared to slip into the routine of the household as her mother prepares Thanksgiving dinner. She has alone time with all the family members and group time with the kids. She is surprised and thrilled by meeting her beloved dog Cecil again, too, and because dogs are dogs, Cecil recognizes her. There is a lot packed into the 36 hours Amy spends in 1978, and she gets an adult’s view of the family’s interactions and words, including both sets of her grandparents. The tension she never realized as a child that existed between her grandparents comes as an eye-opening revelation. The adult Thanksgiving night party is also a completely new piece of information to Amy. And, the everyday items of life were so less advanced than the time Amy had occupied just a few hours before. A television got only a few channels and much of that was poor reception, but no one seem frustrated by it. It was all they knew. Amy is disappointed in herself that she let so many things go seemingly unnoticed that she felt she should have noticed. Of course, she does recognize that a ten-year-old might not be as observant as a forty-six-year-old. After all, a child’s view is quite egocentric.

All along, Amy is writing pieces of information and questions in a notebook, as there are so many comings and goings of the ordinary pieces of life that she never noticed. For example, how had she never realized that so many of her favorite popular songs on the radio as a child had adult lyrics? When did remote controls for television sets come into existence? Amy was constantly checking herself to not say such words as iPhone or Starbucks or cable TV. As you stand and look around your home today, you might ask yourself, when did laminate floors become available? Or, has the mail always been delivered six days a week? Or, when did the wall phone become popular and when did its use die out? When did the microwave oven become an everyday kitchen fixture, and when did the air fryer start to take over? And, when did skinny television sets replace the big heavy ones?

I thoroughly enjoyed this humorous, heartbreaking, renewing journey of Amy Weinland Daughters back to her birds-eye view of her ten-year-old world. It is filled to the brim with interesting contrasts between 1978 and 2014. It examines how people view the same conversation or event differently, and how we too often fail to consider another person’s experience of it. And, memories, can they be trusted? Reading You Cannot Mess This Up played to my fantasy of traveling back in time to my childhood. How many things did I not notice or view differently than others? Did my whistling in the back seat of the car produce a headache for my father as he drove instead of a cheerful tune? Is that why he asked me to stop? Reading this book will have readers re-examining some of their childhood moments, too, and that’s one of the best parts of reading, how we relate personally to it.

Although my favorite reading is mystery/crime, You Cannot Mess This Up was a delightful departure from it. As describes the reactions to so many stories of the heart, I laughed, I cried. The awkwardness of Big Amy’s dealing with an adult education of her previous family life and the love and compassion she feels for Little Amy create plenty of humor and heartache. There are touching moments and moments of utter frustration. Mary tells Amy before she enters her time warp home that she will have questions. But, will Amy gain the answers she needs? It’s a wild thirty-six hour ride for Amy and the reader to determine that.

[Angie]

Requested an ARC for this one. Crossing fingers *edelweiss* :)
Sounds amazing!

Update: Thank you for the ARC, Edelweiss! Going to start this right away!

[Karen · Rating 3 out of 5]

I wanted to like this, but it felt as if the author was trying too hard to be funny. Not for me.

[Erica Elder · Rating 2 out of 5]

I would not recommend this book. I specifically found the odd, randomly placed comments about growing pubic hair off putting. I did stick it out, but I’m not completely sure why.

[Karen Benedetto · Rating 2 out of 5]

REALLY wanted to love it, but didn't. Slogged through just to get to the end.
Meh.
Disappointing.

[Kristakaye · Rating 1 out of 5]

I couldn't finish it. It was a nice journal exercise. 1/3 of the way through I got tired of reading Amy's diary.

Thanks NetGalley for the copy.

[Ashleigh Wilson · Rating 3 out of 5]

Firstly, thank you to the author and publisher for giving me early access to this book in return for my review. It was realty enjoyable! In this book, Amy is going to visit her family over Thanksgiving and mysteriously finds herself travelling back in time by 30 years, experiencing Thanksgiving as a third party in her childhood home with her family and younger self.

The positives:
I loved the concept and thought it was so interesting and well done. The book didn’t get itself bogged down in the lore or the hows and whys, and I loved the no-nonsense way it just happened and that was that.
I thought it was a strong narrative choice to have it focus on just an average family during just an average holiday. There’s a lovely passage near the end of the book celebrating average lives that just really sparked for me.

This book was obviously very personal and very cathartic for the author. The main characters are much richer for being real people and you can tell each and every one of them has been written with love and reality. There was a lot of heart in the book, good use of humour and it did ring true.


The negatives:
Because it’s the story of an average family during an average holiday, I’m not sure what the point in going back was. Nobody is changed as a result of the story and I feel any potential lessons Amy could have learned were missed. Because she wasn’t going back to right any wrongs, prevent anything bad happening or to learn any lessons, it feels long. Nothing actually happens and yet the narrative is plot driven, so you’re waiting for a thing that never comes and it felt a bit of a slog past 60% because it was just a list of events with little to no growth and the same staid analysis.

My biggest issue by far is that Young Amy seems like a regular kid. It was pretty jarring to hear a child constantly be called a freak for reasons that didn’t merit them. It really turned me off adult Amy, both as a protagonist and a mother- I could never talk about a child like that, even if it were a young me. Little Amy isn’t in any way broken and doesn’t display any behaviour out of the ordinary, but is constantly described as weird. I feel like real life adult Amy the author feels chronically unique but has completely misjudged herself. Ironically, she has no idea just how average and normal she is and the self loathing displayed is…interesting but also pretty weird.

[Brooke · Rating 3 out of 5]

When asked that age-old question, “If time travel existed, would you rather travel to the past or future,” I always pick the past. I have a great nostalgia for times gone by and am curious for the way things were. Amy Weinland Daughters takes time travel one step further in her memoir-novel hybrid, You Cannot Mess This Up. In this novel, a 46-year-old Amy travels back to 1978 and spends Thanksgiving with her 10-year-old self (posing as a long-lost cousin.)

With such an intriguing premise, You Cannot Mess This Up is set-up for greatness just on storytelling opportunity alone. What would it be like to meet the child you were? As a former teacher, I often wonder about what I was like as a child, only being able to catch glimpses of my former self from grainy home movies. If we could meet ourselves, would we like ourselves? Would we be able to see our future selves waiting within?

You Cannot Mess This Up is filled with hilarity and awkwardness, while at the same time being incredibly poignant and nostalgic. I connected with Daughters on many passages as she expressed the exact same things I have been feeling and pondering as a now 40-year-old woman evaluating my life. And although I was not yet born in 1978, I greatly enjoyed seeing the year brought back to life in You Cannot Mess This Up, as my own mother graduated from high school in 1978, so I have often heard her talk about it.

On the other hand, You Cannot Mess This Up reads as somewhat of a catharsis for Daughters. As I read this novel, I imagined Daughters wrote this book as a way of working through her feelings and questions about her family and life. I say this because Daughters overflows this novel with personal details, many of which are not particularly important or relevant to the reader, but that would be of great interest to Daughters’ own family. This book would do well to be largely edited down to move at a faster clip and reworked to appeal to broader audience. While many of the details and musings Daughters includes would work well for an actual memoir, they muddle the story in novel form.

Recommended to anyone who has ever been curious about their past or who has a fascination with the late 70s!

[Sue · Rating 4 out of 5]

The year is 2014 and Amy is 46 years old and lives with her husband and sons in Dayton Ohio. Her parents ask her to come to Houston to spend Thanksgiving weekend so that they can discuss their plans for their estate with her and her brother and sister. Somehow when she gets off of the private plane in Houston, she's in the year 1978. She is instructed to spend the next 36 hours with her family in 1978 and pose as a long lost cousin who just happened to be in town and needed a place to spend the holiday. One of the people she spends time with is herself as a 10 year old. I found it very interesting as she relived her memories -- spending time with her parents and looking at them differently as an adult than her 10 year old self did. There were a lot of references to clothes and music, TV cartoons, eating sweet cereal and having dinner at the Bonanza buffet. Some of the biggest things that she had forgotten is that everyone was smoking cigarettes and she was amazed to remember that there were no seat belts in cars. As she spends times with her family, she realizes that the difficult relationships that she had with her family were due to her faulted memory as she grew up and that the family was really more of a nuclear unit that she remembered. She was told that her trip to the past would not change her future but she realizes when she gets back to her real time period that she will never forget her new memories of her past.

The only thing that I didn't like about the book is that there was never a real reason given for Amy to go back into the past. She did learn more about her past but it seems like there should have been some very important reason for the time change. This left me a bit confused about the story.

I'll admit that books about time travel are not my favorite genre but this book may have changed that. It made me spend time thinking about how I would react to being in a similar situation and watching myself at certain ages when I was growing up, spending time with long gone parents and grandparents and having fun with my brothers and sisters back when every day was a new adventure. Reading this book brought back a lot of memories - bad as well as good - and that made appreciate the book even more.

[Janall · Rating 3 out of 5]

Thanks to Net Galley and the publisher for an opportunity to read this book in excellent for an honest review. All opinions are my own.
This is a book that took me awhile to finish. I kept putting it down to think, to savor and to imagine what I would experience if I was in the same situation. This story is a one magical realism- what if you could go back for a day and visit your childhood home, meet your parents as a peer and see yourself as you really were. This story has the author do just that- she goes back to Houston on magical Thanksgiving in 1978, with the cover story of being a long lost aunt from Centerville Ohio. The family welcomes her with open arms, and she gets to see through adult eyes what it was really like, and remembering what was long forgotten.

Especially poignant was seeing herself - a 10 year old ball of freakish energy, at once amplifying the drama and the fun. Her relationships with her siblings were accurate to memory- they had a ball. She didn’t fit in , and a 10 she didn’t care. This was the pinnacle of childhood for little Amy- full of confidence, and zest for life that slowly over the next decade would drain out of her. Meeting her beloved grand parents one more time, and seeing that there was a judgmental undercurrent between them and especially aimed at her mother that she never noticed before. She was able to confirm her suspicions that although her mother didn’t like her much, she really did love her. Lots to process with complicated family dynamics there.

As a Gen X, so much about the late 1970s was nostalgic for me. Playing outside, making up games when the internet didn’t exist. I especially loved the scenes of the mall- having experienced the glamour in its heyday myself as a child was the reason why I chose a career in department store retail. So much has been lost to Amazon- some for the better -no longer needing to emboss multiple copy carbon receipts for credit cards and so much for the worse-a mall full of wonder and everything you could need including a hickory farms.

[Paromjit · Rating 4 out of 5]

Amy Weinland Daughters novel with its interesting premise was first published in 2019. This story is about time travel, the nature of memory, remembering and seeing the differences between being a child and a more reflective adult, and brimming with 1970s nostalgia. Amy is 46 years old, living in Ohio, a mother, returning to Houston, Texas, to talk over her parents estate issues over Thanksgiving, when extraordinarily, she finds herself time travelling to when she was 10 years old in 1978. She has 36 hours back with her family, plus dog, a time that has her reconsidering how her future, her thinking on family, family relationships and belief in her place in the world was shaped by her memories and feelings.

This is a humorous, thought provoking, and entertaining read, that gives us a glimpse back to a time without all the tech we take for granted today, a wonderful reminder of how things used to be in this historical period, allowing us to look back, to compare and contrast. As you might imagine a 10 year old has limited access and perception into people and what might be going on around them, the undercurrents and tensions that might exist, what does the adult Amy make of all this and other revelations, plus she comes face to face with how memories of the same event can differ considerably. There is an array of emotions on display in this roller coaster of a sensitive, insightful and questioning read that offers the opportunity for Amy re-evaluate the present.

I think many readers will be charmed and engaged by the depth, descriptions and details in the writing, and the 1970s celebration fest, the culture, fashion trends, music, gadgets, norms and expectations, and more. This is one I think many are likely to enjoy. Many thanks to the publisher.

[Jnell · Rating 4 out of 5]

I loved going back in time with Big Amy. What a fantastic idea, time traveling to hang out with your younger self and family. I must admit that being a slightly older contemporary of the author and growing up in the North Houston area, most of the appeal of this book to me is the fact that I can remember almost all of the 1978 references; from Hooks Airport to the cars to the neighborhood to the toys to the food to the music to the mall and on and on. Love all that nostalgia stuff. But I have to be brutally honest and say that I didn't enjoy most of the serious, life questioning passages. I do like a bit of introspection but I found myself skipping over the parts where she asks herself a ton of questions in a row. But, truly, how brave it is to get deep with yourself, for all to see, and ask those soul searching questions. Also, in the beginning of the book I found the sentences to be very long, in general, and it took me a while to get into the rhythm of her writing style, the turns of phrases and asides. She is quick with the wit so I just had to pay better attention. To me, the best parts of the book occur when Daughters is describing her younger self - at these times I always had a smile on my face and literally laughed out loud a few times which is a rarity for me. Little Amy's fashion choices were the best! Congratulations, Amy Weinland Daughters, on a wonderful first book. By the way, I got a bit teary eyed when reading the Acknowledgments. Very sweet and heartfelt and, of course, funny.

[Amys Bookshelf Reviews · Rating 4 out of 5]

Amy Weinland Daughters writes an interesting step back in time tale

In You Cannot Mess This Up, the reader is brought into the life of the author, but yet it's also a fictionalized version of her life, but is it really? Amy steps back in time, imagining her life all over again, confronting her own memories, or the version of her memories. I haven't read anything by this author before, and what a hidden gem. This author has a grand imagination, and talent for telling a story. It's a unique perspective, confronting your past, and realizing that your memories are your own and not necessarily someone else's, or even if someone is in your memory, they remember it differently. Thinking about if your life ever mattered, when the truth is, all lives matter, and it is what a person does with them, that makes it matter. It's an interesting story, and I understand the title, and it could mean many things, like the fact that you can't change the past, but how you look at it is not necessarily how others saw it, especially family. Maybe some are long gone, but they are still there. I enjoyed reading the story, feeling the heartbreak, the heart ache, and humor of the life, as she viewed it. A ten-year-old's perspective can also be the same as that adult thirty years later. A reader can get lost in the story. You Cannot Mess This Up is a definite recommendation by Amy's Bookshelf Reviews. I read this book to give my unbiased and honest review. Amy's Bookshelf Reviews recommends that anyone who reads this book also write a review.

[Anne Wolfe · Rating 3 out of 5]

This is a cute and original story idea: A 46-year-old woman is mysteriously returned to her house and family in 1978. It was funny, in places, and entertaining, but ultimately in annoyed the heck out of me. Amy Weinland Daughters simply cannot keep from inserting "woman parts", "man parts" and many, many other euphemistic instead of actual words. She also drops in references to growing pubic hair (why?) and giving birth to large -headed children (coming out of her woman part)

What is entertaining is the contrast between our tech-infused world and the simpler world of land lines, radios, phonographs, and large cars without seat belts. Also amusing were the descriptions of Houston neighborhoods (amusing to me since I lived in Houston for 14 years starting just after the time of the book.

Decide for yourself whether an imaginary trip to your own past where you had the opportunity to meet your own 10-year-old self is worth your time and effort. Having ploughed through to the end, I'm not sure it was. But thanks to NetGalley and She Writes Press for an ARC copy to read and review.

[Laurie · Rating 4 out of 5]

I really liked this story!
It brought me back to my days in the 1970's and just how much has changed from then to now!
Amy Daughters has went back in time from 2014 to Thanksgiving 1978 back in her own family, but as an adult.
She sees herself, her siblings and her parents as they were, yet the dysfunction and memories seem so different than Amy remembers.
I loved the magic of "going back" and wish I could do the same.
Memories are definitely different for each person.
Ahhh... to live a day or two in the past when life seemed simple and easy. Or was it?
If you enjoy historical fiction(?) or have lived in this time, you will definitely enjoy going back in time with "Big" Amy to learn some things and see some of her memories.
Thank you to @ NetGalley and to @Simon & Schuster for this ARC and allowing me to read and provide my own review!

[Courtney · Rating 4 out of 5]

A friend of a friend wrote this blow-me-out of the water time travel, family baggage book and it is a great summer read - especially for women in my late 40s / 50+ age group who spent their childhood in the weirdness of the 70s. I don’t want to give much away except if you ever wondered what it would be like to go back in time and spend a day or two with your family and younger self, self discovery and all, this is the book for you. You Can’t Mess This Up is full of laughs, some sobering mother-daughter revelations, sibling rivalry, dead grandparents, and a lot of cocktail party conversations, and some heartwarming scenes between “Big Amy” and her geeky, annoying and charming 10 year old self. Do yourself a favor and order this book today!

[Lynda Coleman Chilton · Rating 5 out of 5]

I loved this book!! Written so beautifully and authentic, the book really gets to the heart of what matters in life! It made me want to travel back in time and give my 1978 self a hug and boost of self-confidence. If you are a middle child or even if you’re not but an oldest or youngest sibling, you will love this story! It will also make you think about life and what’s important most of all- Love! I loved every single 1978 reference as it brought back my own vivid memories of years gone by.. it leaves you with a nostalgic, heart warming feeling and also makes you think that it’s never too late to say things that should not be left unsaid!

[Maggie Kenworthy · Rating 3 out of 5]

This was a quick read for me that I did truly enjoy.
I'm usually not a fan of time travel books, but this one was more believable to me than most. You could tell the author heavily researched the time period of locations before writing, which really helped transport the reader right alongside the main character Amy. I did have some questions regarding the main purpose of the time travel and noticed a few inconsistencies within the specifics of time traveling. My favorite part was seeing Amy at two different ages and I left the book loving younger Amy and questioning why the other characters always seemed annoyed with her.