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4.05 AVERAGE
4.05 AVERAGE
reflective
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
Complicated
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Complicated
I was really enjoying it until the last hour, where I thought I was going to be disappointed with the ending. Then it got me again.
fast-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
No
Loveable characters:
No
Diverse cast of characters:
No
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
Casablanca sounds like such a glamorous and exotic place. I've read so much WWII fiction but not set in Casablanca. I enjoyed learning about it and it's role in the war. As typical for me, I enjoyed the historical story more than the modern day one. I found the modern day woman to be wimpy and weak and boring. However, my feelings changed when I learned why she was that way. I absolutely adored the scrappy Josie who was a vivacious reader and adventurer in WWII times. Overall , the story was compelling and the plot moved at a nice pace. I learned a lot without it feeling like a textbook. Enjoyed.
I enjoyed this book, particularly the audiobook and thought it evoked well how expats have to set up life in a new home and how some expats insulate themselves in Western style malls, but others do throw themselves into learning more about the history, culture and lifestyles of those around them.
This was an interesting dual narrative retelling - covering an area of WWII I know little about, namely the war in Morocco.
I enjoyed the descriptions of Casablanca and found them to be very realistic and called back memories of my own trip to Casablanca.
It also wove an interesting narrative around grief and the use of quilting in different ways to tell stories and illicit hope.
“‘She sees that your heart is filled with grief. You need to go to the ocean. Write the names of the things you’ve lost on stones you will find there and then cast them away into the waters. The ocean is big enough to take your grief and keep it safe for you, freeing up space in your heart for other things. The dreamseller says this is an important lesson for you to learn now and you must remember it. It will help you later in life.’
This was an interesting dual narrative retelling - covering an area of WWII I know little about, namely the war in Morocco.
I enjoyed the descriptions of Casablanca and found them to be very realistic and called back memories of my own trip to Casablanca.
It also wove an interesting narrative around grief and the use of quilting in different ways to tell stories and illicit hope.
“‘She sees that your heart is filled with grief. You need to go to the ocean. Write the names of the things you’ve lost on stones you will find there and then cast them away into the waters. The ocean is big enough to take your grief and keep it safe for you, freeing up space in your heart for other things. The dreamseller says this is an important lesson for you to learn now and you must remember it. It will help you later in life.’
dark
mysterious
reflective
tense
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Plot
Strong character development:
No
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
No
Flaws of characters a main focus:
No
This was a decent read about a contemporary woman learning a story of a young Jewish girl fleeing the Holocaust through artifacts. Overall, this was a fairly quick read. I liked how the author chose to blend the two timelines together by the end of the book. I thought the weakest part of the story was the modern day timeline. I did not care much for the contemporary main character and her rocky marriage in the beginning of the book. I was very pleased to see it get better over the course of the book, though ultimately the reveal was something I didn't care for.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Death, Genocide, Miscarriage, Antisemitism, Grief, Fire/Fire injury, War, Injury/Injury detail, Deportation
emotional
informative
inspiring
reflective
sad
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Complicated
emotional
inspiring
sad
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
No
emotional
hopeful
sad
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Complicated
challenging
emotional
hopeful
informative
inspiring
reflective
sad
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
Two side by side narratives that meet up. A Jewish girl, refugee, in Casablanca, called Josie, writes a diary that is read by Zoe, an ex pat in 2010.
Josie is precocious (insult-coded) and she gets even worse when she's given a thesaurus. The only interesting thing about Zoe is she has OCD (washes her hands a lot). This is becauseshe had a baby and the baby died from meningitis, and she feels guilty because she thinks it was germs on her own hands that killed her daughter. She hallucinates her daughter throughout the text, which is the big plot twist that I guessed fairly early on.
This is a book that relies heavily on tell, don't show. It's not doing anything original, and the voice given to Josie is incredibly annoying for saying she's only 13. It's also an attempt at a refugee narrative that ties the Jewish plight to modern refugee crises, while providing literally not one tiny systemic criticism. A bunch of multicultural women make a quilt together in a women's refuge centre and it's very like... "and the silence of despair was replaced with the chatter of women laughing and children giggling".
I don't suggest reading this book and I wish I'd tapped out earlier. I just wanted to know if the baby was real or not, guys. I'm giving it a star for the suspense.
Josie is precocious (insult-coded) and she gets even worse when she's given a thesaurus. The only interesting thing about Zoe is she has OCD (washes her hands a lot). This is because
This is a book that relies heavily on tell, don't show. It's not doing anything original, and the voice given to Josie is incredibly annoying for saying she's only 13. It's also an attempt at a refugee narrative that ties the Jewish plight to modern refugee crises, while providing literally not one tiny systemic criticism. A bunch of multicultural women make a quilt together in a women's refuge centre and it's very like... "and the silence of despair was replaced with the chatter of women laughing and children giggling".
I don't suggest reading this book and I wish I'd tapped out earlier. I just wanted to know if the baby was real or not, guys. I'm giving it a star for the suspense.