Family Lore
Ratings19
Average rating3.6
15
Ratings19
Average rating3.6
A Most Anticipated Book of 2023 from: Today.com * Time * Electric Literature * Seattle Times * Telemundo * Washington Post * HipLatina * Harper's Bazaar * Elle * AARP * Shondaland * New York Times * The Millions * LitHub From the bestselling, National Book Award–winning author Elizabeth Acevedo comes her first novel for adults, the story of one Dominican-American family told through the voices of its women as they await a gathering that will forever change their lives. Flor has a gift: she can predict, to the day, when someone will die. So when she decides she wants a living wake—a party to bring her family and community together to celebrate the long life she’s led—her sisters are surprised. Has Flor foreseen her own death, or someone else’s? Does she have other motives? She refuses to tell her sisters, Matilde, Pastora, and Camila. But Flor isn’t the only person with secrets: her sisters are hiding things, too. And the next generation, cousins Ona and Yadi, face tumult of their own. Spanning the three days prior to the wake, Family Lore traces the lives of each of the Marte women, weaving together past and present, Santo Domingo and New York City. Told with Elizabeth Acevedo’s inimitable and incandescent voice, this is an indelible portrait of sisters and cousins, aunts and nieces—one family’s journey through their history, helping them better navigate all that is to come.
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i appreciated this story so much and all the variety of women's issues that is told. i love elizabeth acevedo's writing but i didn't enjoy the non-linear, constantly switching perspective nature of this book.
This book wasn't bad but it was also clearly not for me. I've read 3 other books by this author and loved all of them, this one was just okay for me.
There are multiple POVs and it was hard for me to keep track of what happened to whom, when and of what actually did matter. The writing is beautiful and compelling however I can't help but feel like it was lacking an actual plot. The whole thing about the woman wanting a baby bored me half to death (it will probably resonate with some people but personally I don't care for that type of story and I found it hard not to skim).
On the plus side I really liked the name Pastoria.
Elizabeth Acevedo never disappoints me with her writing. I love the complexity of her characters and how real they always feel, and this book was no different. Being of Afro-Carribean descent myself, I always feel a connection to books following characters of similar backgrounds, despite the family being from a different island than my family is. I felt connected to the women that we follow in so many ways and it definitely elevated the reading experience for me. Elizabeth's writing is so lyrical and reads like poetry. This book reminded me of how much I love her books, and I'm excited to read anything she writes in the future.
Thank you to Ecco and NetGalley for providing me with an eBook copy to review.
It really pains me to say my absolute favourite YA writer's foray into adult fiction is a miss for me. Although I've previously loved, been thrilled moved by or enamoured with Elizabeth Acevedo's books, this has barely registered as a blip. I couldn't care less about the characters, the recurrent references to sex I found distasteful (don't get me wrong, not the references themselves, but the way they were done). I would say the only saving grace were the family relationships and the - unfortunately - rather infrequent mentions of food - which reminded me of With the fire on high, but they were too few and far between.
