The Resolutions

by Brady Hammes

After an injury cripples her dance career in the US, Sam is scouted by a wealthy Russian investor seeking ballerinas for his Versailles-esque campus in rural Russia. Not only is she geographically cut-off from the rest of the world, Sam isolates herself from friends and family as her heroin addiction takes control.

Similarly alone, Jonah, her brother, is monitoring elephants in the thick of Gabon. An unfortunate crossing with a poacher soon pulls Jonah into the orbit of ivory traffickers whose connection he cannot sever until he has carried out exactly what they have asked of him.

And then there's the third and oldest of the siblings whose life, by his own reckoning, has gone most awry. Gavin, in the midst of a quarter-life crisis, has just been written off his fledgling TV show, newly-dumped, and ruined his chances with a regional production (and an engaged regional director). All three siblings reunite in their home of Chicago to confront their past and prove that the bond between siblings is unshakeable... even in the throes of an unfathomable, and foreign, danger.

Genres: Fiction, Family, Audiobook, Contemporary

320 pages, Hardcover

First published May 5, 2020

About the author

Brady Hammes is a writer and documentary film editor living in Los Angeles. The Resolutions is his first novel.

Reviews

[Jennifer ~ TarHeelReader · Rating 4 out of 5]

The Resolutions is the story of three siblings. Sam is a dancer who experiences a tragic injury. She is scouted by a big deal opportunity for ballerinas in Russia, but instead, Sam finds herself addicted to heroin and shut off from everyone she loves.

Sam’s brother, Jonah, lives and works in Gabon monitoring elephants. He has a dangerously close run-in with ivory poachers.

Gavin is the oldest, experiencing a quarter-life crisis. He’s having job and relationship difficulties like no other at this point.

The three siblings come together in Chicago to lean on each other. I love stories of siblings! Each one is at a turning point in their lives, and my favorite part was the way the siblings come together. Wait, scratch that. I think the ending was my favorite! The Resolutions is easily readable and engaging storytelling at its finest.

I received a gifted copy. All opinions are my own.

Many of my reviews can also be found on my blog: www.jennifertarheelreader.com and instagram: www.instagram.com/tarheelreader

[Faith · Rating 3 out of 5]

This book had no plot until the last 25%. Until then it just related the banal details of the lives of three siblings who converge on Chicago to visit their parents for Christmas. Samantha is a drug-addicted ballerina working in Moscow until she gets fired for unreliability. Gavin is a mediocre actor who’s TV series has been cancelled. Other than unemployment, his problem is deciding between two women, neither of whom is all that into him. Jonah has the only interesting storyline. He is a grad student studying elephants in Ghana, although he too is doing a mediocre job. Then he gets involved in an ivory smuggling scheme, leading to heartbreaking and disgusting details of the ivory trade. All three of the siblings are whiny, immature and self pitying. Honestly, I can’t tell you what the point of all of this is. The writing wasn’t bad, so maybe it’s just my mood. Given the state of the world I don’t want to hear about these people.

I received a free copy of this book from the publisher.

[Laura • lauralovestoread · Rating 3 out of 5]

3.5 stars!

The Resolutions is an emotional debut that explores the dynamics of the strained relationships between three siblings.

I loved the focus on each sibling as they come to a crossroad in their professional life. While I’m a sucker for a book with family dysfunction, it goes much deeper than that, and I love that each sibling is coming together after time spent apart.

Struggles with drug addiction, failed relationships, and a stagnant career, they each had obstacles in their lives, but must face their demons in order to help one another out.

*thank you to Ballantine Books for the gifted copy. All opinions are my own

[Karen R · Rating 4 out of 5]

Three grown, estranged siblings living under wildly different circumstances converge at their mother’s home for the Christmas holidays. Samantha is an exceptional ballet dancer living in Moscow, coping with heroin addiction, Jonah is living alone in the Gabon forest of Africa as a field assistant studying elephants’ communications in their habitat during growing unrest and ivory poaching. He is ‘drinking too much and accomplishing very little’. Gaven is an unemployed actor, unlucky in love. My favorite thread was Jonah’s story which became complex and eye-opening after he gets tangled up with a poaching extortionist thug named Slinky .

[Whitney · Rating 4 out of 5]

Thank you, Random House, for the free ebook. The Resolutions was an unexpected joy to read. The separate stories of three siblings, begun across different countries, are slowly drawn back together as each struggles to come to terms with personal failure. The only sister faces the end of a brilliant career ballet because of her heroin addiction; the older brother is unable to move forward in his career or sustain meaningful relationships towards the marriage and family he strongly desires; and the last sibling finds himself tangled in a web of impossible choices in his elephant research position in Gabon. I was completely drawn into each narrative. Hammes uses vibrant language to describe his characters' inner turmoil. The plot starts at three separate points around the globe - West Africa, Russia, and Los Angeles - draws everyone together in Chicago, and culminates in Gabon, in a somewhat bizarre African ritual. The ending felt a little too tidy for me, but maybe I was just skeptical that people who have made such spectacularly irresponsible decisions could have a happy ending. Nevertheless, the examination of sibling relationships was fascinating, and I thoroughly enjoyed reading this book.

[Aimee Dars]

The Brennan siblings—Gavin, Jonah, and Samantha—boast impressive resumes. Gavin, living in Los Angeles, stars in a television show, Sam, a talented dancer, is a featured performer at a well-funded (if remote) Russian dance company, and Jonah, a graduate student studying elephant communication, conducts field work in the forests of Gabon.

However, as they all travel home to Chicago for the holidays, they each harbor deep anxieties. Gavin’s relationship has just ended, and his show canceled, leaving him wondering if acting is the right profession for him. Sam arrives home unemployed as her heroin addiction got her kicked out of the dance company, and Jonah has involuntarily become a courier in an ivory smuggling operation. Both Sam and Jonah desperately attempt to keep their plights hidden, while their mother advises them not to bring up Gavin’s show.

Despite their efforts, the siblings learn at least some of each other’s trials, and when Jonah returns to Gabon, Gavin and Sam leave with him, pretending for their parents’ sake that they are going back to their regular lives. In Western Africa, though, they become caught up in dangerous political and criminal unrest, and all the things that were so comfortably unspoken bubble to the surface and demand attention.

I am an only child and am fascinated by sibling relationships, and I also like to read about lives on the edge, so I was attracted by the description of The Resolutions by Brady Hammes. This debut novel contains interesting reflections and some lovely writing. It contained too much graphic detail about elephant poaching without any seeming purpose for my taste. I would have at least wanted comeuppance of the perpetrators or conveyance of why such slaughter is wrong, but those aspects were missing. Furthermore, the poaching operation was much more prevalent in the narrative than I expected.

While the novel is told entirely in third person, the perspective shifts between the three siblings, and the secondary characters are rather flat, which might be by design, to show how the siblings shine brighter than anyone else to each other. What few flashbacks there are I remember being told from Gavin’s point of view and include stories about him and Sam—Jonah is almost always excluded, which seems a strange choice.

Beyond sibling relationships, the book shows how a small decision or action can create a tidal wave of consequences. Because the initial decisions of these characters were so poor or so impetuous, summoning empathy for them was difficult.

The Resolutions was an interesting, though-provoking read, and I liked Hammes’s writing style, but I did not enjoy anything related to elephant poaching, and I thought the characterization was uneven. Overall, though, this is a solid debut, and I will definitely watch for Hammes’s future work.

Thank you to NetGalley and Ballantine Books/Random House for an advance reading copy in exchange for an honest review.

[Lolly K Dandeneau · Rating 4 out of 5]

via my blog: https://bookstalkerblog.wordpress.com/
"The architecture of her life began to crumble."

In The Resolutions by Brady Hammes, the architecture of all three siblings lives (Sam, Jonah and Gavin) have begun to crumble. Sam was so full of promise, a talented, skilled ballerina before an injury destroyed her dreams. Salvation came with a Russian dance company northeast of Moscow. Living at “Chàteau Oksana” feels more like a campus, which is exactly what everyone calls it. Meant to dazzle, charm the guests at monthly parties, her life is wearing her down, but nothing more than her old injury and the death of her days dancing with the New York City Ballet when she was only 18. Heroin is an escape from everything that pains her in this place that is a blanket of snow, the perfect place to bury one’s dreams. Isolated though this place may be, such demons can only be tolerated for so long.

Jonah is the intellectual in the family, distanced from his artistic siblings. He feels lonely, ready to attempt to strengthen the bonds. Jonah came to Gabon, Africa to assist his thesis advisor at Vanderbilt, studying the vocalization of forest elephants, planting ARUS (Autonomous Recording Units) to better understand how the animals communicate. It’s important work, but a mountain of pressure when his advisor takes ill, leaving Jonah in the forests of solitude and danger.Just as he is readying himself for a trip home, hoping to connect with his little sister and older brother he falls into an abyss of trouble all because his camera gets stolen. Soon he has the threat of poachers looming over his head, but that is just the beginning. Trouble rises, someone has a plan and he has no choice but to obey. Sometimes it’s the stable, quiet one whose mistakes could cost lives.

Gavin is the actor, but a decent face isn’t always enough to bounce back. Maybe his career was thriving years ago, but now it feels like “making it big”in the industry just isn’t going to happen. What was it all for? His relationship has ended and now, his show. On the horizon there is Marina and a cabin in Taos, but all that glistens isn’t gold. He is too old to feel like he has to start over again, too old to believe his dreams will come true and definitely old enough to know better about… well… everything. Now he is sorely needed at home. Just who needs saving? Maybe they all do.

This novel explores the shifting dynamics within sibling relationships, and how our dreams sometimes have to die to be reborn into something new. The slightest change in our fate can send us hurtling, but what is life but weather? The damage we try to keep close is sometimes best shared with our loved ones, because sometimes they really do have to step in and help steer the wreckage we’ve made of ourselves. Even the perfect, most promising child can trip up. Sometimes saving others saves us too.

Publication Date: May 5, 2020

Random House

Ballantine Books

[Jordan (Jordy’s Book Club) · Rating 2 out of 5]

QUICK TAKE: you had me at multigenerational family drama. you lost me at a poaching subplot that involved mutilating elephants. Totally took me out of it. Also, the siblings never quite clicked for me (probably because they spend most of the book in different countries), and the strange drug rehab journey to a Ayahuasca-esque village in Africa felt like a completely different book. Very bad, not good people doing very bad, not good things. Unfortunately not for me.

[Jeanette (Ms. Feisty) · Rating 4 out of 5]

I very much enjoyed this story of three siblings who have all come to a crossroads in their lives. The way they work together to achieve "the resolutions" took me by surprise and fascinated me.

Thank you to the publisher and net galley for the ARC.

[Sharon M · Rating 4 out of 5]

Many thanks to NetGalley, Ballantine Books, and Brady Hammes for the opportunity to read his debut fiction - 4 stars for this sibling dynamic story.

Three siblings - Gavin, Jonah and Samantha - are all talented in different ways and have been living very different lives. Gavin, a struggling actor, has been living in LA and working on a cable tv show that was just canceled. Jonah is working on his PhD thesis and studying elephants in the jungle of Gabon, and recently fell in with a bad crowd. Samantha was a rising ballet star until an injury got her hooked on opioids. She thought taking a job with a Russian ballet company would help her but it hasn't worked out. The three meet back in Chicago for Christmas with their parents and discover that they need each other to help solve their problems.

This story is told from the POV of each of the siblings, giving us background into how they got to their current situation. It was a great character novel - I would have loved an epilogue to know how it all turned out at the end!

[Amy Bird · Rating 5 out of 5]

LOVED this book. I read it in 48 hours because I couldn't put this page turner down. I was fascinated by the three different characters and how the author weaved their individual stories together. Great read and I would highly recommend.

[˗ˏˋ maddie ˊˎ˗ · Rating 3 out of 5]

full disclosure: i received a copy through a goodreads giveaway.

this sat pretty firmly at 'fine.' there was nothing about it that made me want to desperately shove it into someone else's hands to share the joy of it, but there wasn't anything that made me want to put it down and never return either. gavin was a prick but seeing as he was a white man pursuing acting in l.a., that tracked. jonah was kind of... a loose piece? i didn't get much of a sense of his connection with his siblings, we got a lot of gavin deciding he was sam's protector as the older brother and anecdotes of his childhood with her but none about his younger brother, which seemed... like an oversight. and since jonah had the most action-packed storyline, to have him be kind of a faded outlier was strange. sam, comparatively, had the most interesting progression but that adjective rests heavily on the 'comparatively.' none of it was gripping, but all of it was readable and easy and... i won't remember much, if any, of it by tomorrow?

[Rachel | All the RAD Reads · Rating 1 out of 5]

I honestly don’t know what positive spin to put on this one... I didn’t get it. Dysfunctional characters, bizarre plot lines for each sibling, nothing like able or redemptive or even rational about them... it was baffling to me. But hey, if you like books that have heroin addicts and elephant poachers and Russian dance troupes and failed LA actors and ivory dealers and sibling drama and affairs and drug trips in the forest, this one’s for you!!!

[Teresa Kennedy · Rating 4 out of 5]

This was a good story with many twists and turns. The characters were interesting and believable.

[Chris Roberts · Rating 1 out of 5]

Heroin addiction and a faster sports car,
Like druggie glam or how we slam, double damned,
paid out, laid out, comes the past, twice-cast,
another day, another hype,
zero to ninety, floor it, score it - I got to hit it -
nobody cares, a dead junkie and live one look the same.

#poem

Chris Roberts, Patron Saint to the Movement

[Becky · Rating 3 out of 5]

3.5 Stars


Some of my very favorite books are about sibling relationships.  Maybe because of my own family (one brother, one sister), I’m drawn to stories like these?  I’m not sure but I’m always sold on a book like this. 

The Resolutions is about 3 siblings with very different lives.  Their lives are extreme, really, and you’d likely have a hard time finding other families with kids like this – one is an unemployed Hollywood actor, one is a drug addicted ballerina, and the other studies elephants in the midst of poaching (warning, this is not for the faint of heart) in West Africa. The three come together for Christmas with their parents and a drama filled adventure follows.  Let’s be real, it’s not relatable (I’ll join the chorus saying the best books are unrelatable!!!  That’s how we learn and gain empathy for others.) - none of us are living lives like this. But I loved the first 2/3 of the book – the siblings were interesting, and their relationships were fraught with uncovered issues – now that was relatable.  Things went off the rails a bit (ok, maybe a lot), but I just tried to suspend disbelief and enjoy the ride.  It was everything BUT the ride that I liked the most. Just tell me about the siblings, I don’t need the crazy side story.

So overall, this was good but I wanted better. More of this - “He thought of his siblings like appendages, things that had always been there and he imagined always would be....it’s like a part of yourself you can never really know.” Yes!

[Candace · Rating 4 out of 5]

"The Resolutions" is a readable novel that almost works. First-time author Brady Hammes takes three adult siblings in unusual circumstances and brings them together to save one of their lives. That life does not turn out to be the one that necessarily needs saving, which is what gives this book it's spark.

Sam is a gifted ballerina who jumps at the chance to join a Russian oligarch's private ballet company in Siberia. She hopes to explore new horizons in dance, and to distance herself from her heroin addiction. Jonah is in the bush of Gabon, monitoring elephants. Gavin leaves LA when his series is cancelled to explore a theater opportunity.All three have taken themselves out of their comfort zones to expand their understanding of art or science, and it is all strange and threatening.

As "The Resolutions" comes to a pretty exciting end, I found myself asking "how did these people come up with this awful idea, and how did they pay for it?"

For some reason this novel is being compared to "The Nest," which I do not see at all. If you pick up this book expecting the same kind of thing, you'll be disappointed. Read "The Resolutions" on it's own merits, and you'll be surprised.

Thanks to the publisher and Netgalley for the review copy!

~~Candace Siegle, Greedy Reader

[SHIRLEY · Rating 3 out of 5]

I had a hard time getting into this book as the first half described each of the three siblings along with their backgrounds and dilemmas. Each of them had opportunities for getting along in their chosen field and each had demons and made decisions which knocked them down and made their aspirations unattainable.
When they got to Chicago for Christmas, they reached a crossroads where they had to face each other and realize that something had to change. I didn't quite see how they all ended up going to Africa rather than their respective homes, but maybe an editor tightened that up in the final edition. I felt sorry for Jonah as he ended up with the other 2 in his home base and unintentionally endangered them. I do think, however, that the 3 of them managed to come out of Africa changed for the better.
There were a few unlikely events in the novel, and too many co-incidences, but I think that the last 25% pretty well tied the story together- maybe a little too nicely, but I was OK with that. The key point that I got out of the book was how one's choices can create unintended consequences.
I received this book from NetGalley, Random House, Ballentine Books in exchange for an honest review.

[Lesley · Rating 2 out of 5]

I feel very bad about rating this book at 2 stars as I received a pre-publication copy from the publisher but I hope they really want honest answers. To be truthful, this is not the type of novel I normally choose to read and you might love the book.

The first 100 pages was used to introduce us to the three protagonists, a young dancer and her two brothers, one of whom is a mediocre actor, the other a grad student doing elephant research in Gabon. The was no plot until after page 100 and by this time I didn't particularly care for any of the characters.

I kept reading, wondering how someone could possibly think they could fly from Gabon to Chicago with ivory tusks in their luggage and get away with it. From then on, I didn't care about anyone but I did want to see how the book ended. I never did find out because I closed the book at a paragraph that made me want to vomit.

The writing at least was OK. Nothing special to complain about but a far, far cry from the Salman Rushdie book which I am now reading.

[Ann Marie · Rating 4 out of 5]

What an excellent book about a family the Brennans with 3 kids who grow up close but now are having big problems that threaten their careers. I really identified with the sister Samantha and her struggles. Her two brothers also have a lot of trouble Jonah and Gavin. All very serious problems and very different.

They come together for the holidays and with their close bond try to find a resolution for all of them together. Wow, this book was really good. I highly recommend it, especially if you like a good drama and love to see a family, or siblings, trying to help another, which is rare in my big family. This book made me want to have a family like this. But don't let me fool you, their problems are very big problems, very different problems and together they try to go away together and find resolutions. This book was very emotional for me, especially identifying with Samantha and her struggles.I gave e it a 4.25 stars!


Special thanks to NetGalley, Random House, and Ballantine Books for my ARC copy of this book!

[Addie BookCrazyBlogger · Rating 4 out of 5]

Three siblings, Gavin, Jonah and Sam, are all facing dead careers when they are called home to Chicago for Christmas. Gavin is a failed actor who moves to New Mexico to act in a community theater play, as drawn to the engaged female director, as a moth is drawn to a flame. Jonah is puttering around Africa, attempting to research the elephants and managing to get on the wrong side of poachers. Sam is a professional dancer whose hiding a nasty heroin habit and trying to pretend like everything is fine for her dance company. When the three come home for Christmas, all of their problems manage to follow them and it becomes a question of how to solve the issues. I personally really loved this book. I thought the descriptions of West Africa were beautiful and the journey Sam has to try to get sober felt desperate, sad. The novel covers some pretty interesting events, especially around animal welfare. As good as this story was, I didn’t feel like I was able to ever fully connect with the characters.

[Debbie · Rating 4 out of 5]

Three grown siblings are all at a crossroads in both their personal and professional lives. Gavin is an unemployed actor in LA who has just gotten out of a long-term relationship. Samantha is a ballerina who is addicted to opiates. Jonah studies elephants in Africa and has gotten involved with the wrong crowd. They are pulled together during the Christmas holidays while visiting their parents in Chicago. From reading the book synopsis, I thought that more of the book would take place with the three together than it did but that's okay. I really enjoyed reading each POV. I will say that I'm a huge fan of elephant conservation and there were some triggering scenes involving elephants in this novel so beware.
Only criticism of this story is that I felt that it wrapped up a little quickly after all of the build up. I would have liked to have seen an epilogue.
Thanks to NetGalley and Random House Ballantine for an ARC in return for my honest review.

[Kathleen Gray · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is not the dysfunctional family novel you might think it is. This is about three siblings, divided by time, space, and interests, who actually come together to save one of them. No spoilers but each of them has a major issue. Sam, a ballerina, has found herself addicted to heroin and living a dissolute life in Russia- far from her glory days with the NYCB. Jonah has been monitoring elephants in Gabon and he's run afoul of the poachers. Animal lovers know that there are some distressing things here. Gavin's an actor but he's messed things up big time both personally and professionally. While nominally set in Chicago where the three reunite, most of the story is set in the other locations. It might seem a bit farfetched that one set of siblings could end up in these places and circumstances but go with it. Thanks to Netgalley for the ARC. Nicely written and unlike some authors in this genre, Hammes is empathetic to his characters.

[Wrenn · Rating 3 out of 5]

This story explores the relationships between three siblings.
Sam, a talented dancer whose injury cut short her career in the states. Now she is with a troupe in Russia, but is battling drug addiction.
Her older brother Gavin is an actor who just found out his new series has been canceled.
And Jonah is living in Gabon as a researcher, observing elephants and trying to stay away from ivory poachers.
When they come together for Christmas with their parents in Chicago, they decide to embark on a path that will put them at risk and test their bonds.
Although I enjoyed the writing and the creative storyline, I didn't feel much connection with the characters and some of their actions were a little implausible.
But I am still looking forward to the next book by this author.
Thank you Random House Publishing Group- Ballantine for the e-ARC via NetGalley.

[Rebekah · Rating 1 out of 5]

Brady Hammes' 'The Resolutions' is an attempt to tackle the complex complexities of friendship and personal growth, but it ends up feeling like a college group project with everyone forgetting about the deadline. The plot meanders with the urgency of a snail on a leisurely stroll, and the characters exhibit about as much depth as a kiddie pool.

Hammes’ writing is so overwrought with clichés and melodrama that you’d swear it was sponsored by a soap opera.

The resolutions themselves, pivotal as they are, come off as forced and uninspired, like New Year’s resolutions that are abandoned by February.

In essence, "The Resolutions" reads like a bad self-help book disguised as fiction, offering more eye-rolls than insights. If you’re seeking literary enlightenment, best to resolve to read something else.

[Doris Vandruff · Rating 5 out of 5]

Samantha, Gavin and Jonah are three accomplished siblings. Samantha has the talent and drive of being a ballerina. Jonah has gone to college and has the degrees of his chosen career. He is studying the language of elephants in Africa. Gavin has made his mark as an actor. All seem to be on the road to success. Until life happens. Now all three are forced to he together. Each has a different dilemma they must work through.
Thos book is about siblings. Rivalry between siblings and love and compassion and dedication between siblings. How far would you go to help your siblings?
Great read!

[Ilyssa Wesche · Rating 3 out of 5]

This was comped to The Nest and I can definitely see why. This was kind of way out there in terms of plot - a family with a heroin addict ballet dancer in Russia, a failed C list actor and an elephant scholar caught up in an ivory smuggling scheme? It was a LOT of disbelief to suspend and I had a little trouble in the end keeping up and believing. But where this book succeeds is in the sibling relationships. Although I am closer to my brothers than Sam was to hers, I could imagine myself in that bar on Christmas Eve.

[Paula Hamblen · Rating 5 out of 5]

Couldn’t put it down. I liked the manner in which the characters were introduced. Having two brothers I could identify with the relationship between the siblings. . Also, having lived almost 30 years in the Chicago area I enjoyed the accurate and detailed description of Chicago. Lately, I have been disappointed in the conclusions of most books i have read. The Resolutions had a great ending and didn’t feel as if the author forced the ending.

[Olya · Rating 3 out of 5]

A good idea, probably would be a good movie if some life themes would have been open up more deeply, more philosophical or something. Book seemed too shallow. Very very graphic description of elephants killing, cutting their faces, etc. Not sure why? Why in a book? To attract attention? Maybe, WK. I didn't like that much description of poachers and their doings. Ends kind of...nowhere. No resolutions, no conclusion, neither here, nor there. Like...and? Airport reading definitely.

[Aida Alberto · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is one debut author who has the foundation to go far. This debut is taunt and emotional. It's glued to your seat reading that will immerse you in the lives of three siblings and their bond with one another. It's a must read. Can't wait to see what this author comes up with next. Happy reading! #TheResolutions #NetGalley