The Bright family is your typical American family. John is a retired senator and is married to Patty. They have four grown children: JJ is married to Mary Beth and they have twin sons named Lucas and Cameron, Spencer is married to Ian, Charlie is a free spirit and is with Chelsea, and there's Philip the youngest.

This year they are having their usual summer vacation at their summer home. This time, however, John is going to allow Farah, a documentary producer, to film the whole vacation. Most of the family is not happy about this, but John feels it will be great for them to let the public see how they live. The back plan is that is he going to come out of retirement and run for office again.

So now all of them are at the house and Farah starts recording everything. The problems start when John lets everyone know he is going to run. The announcement is made to the public and the rumors start flying. Apparently, several women have come forward claiming that John had abused them. Of course, at first, John denies it, but as more women come forward, he has no choice but to admit he did. People seemed to be able to accept this and the family thought everything would be all right. Until, out of nowhere, the biggest shocker comes out. . . Can the family recover from this?

Wow, I would almost think that THE MISFORTUNES OF FAMILY by Meg Little Reilly was written about certain families now. Reilly shows how, no matter what, family does come first. Reilly also shows the differing relationships between the father and his sons, and how that comes in to play later in the story. 

I have to say, at times I felt sorry for Phillip -  he seemed to be the son that no one paid much attention to and they all felt that he just didn’t know what he wanted out of life. Patty, the senator's wife, seemed to really love the life they lived, but keeping all those secrets have taken a toll on her. This really is a great book, would love to see a follow up on this book, just to see how they all survived all these shockers.