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3.55 AVERAGE
3.55 AVERAGE
challenging
emotional
reflective
tense
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
Complicated
Loveable characters:
Complicated
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Complicated
Surprisingly thrilling.
I typically like books that are written in vignettes. Vignettes that cover clips of memory from past to present. This book failed to keep my interest. I enjoyed Leah, but so did not enjoy her mother, the primary narrator. But I think what I mostly did not enjoy was the lack of insight that the mother had on her own behaviors. There was no character development whatsoever. But maybe that is also a reflection of the difficult cycles that women and mothers get into. Overall this book was very boring and had a more intriguing synopsis. The "big thing" didn't really feel like a big thing, in my opinion as a reader. Maybe I do not have enough of a cultural understanding of Israel (I certainly have my cautious and justified judgements re: Palestine) and the way life is navigated in that region. It could just not be for me. I so wanted it to be, though.
I can’t decide how to rate this book, I feel more like it’s a 3.5 for me. I enjoyed it, I’m glad I read it, but it isn’t one I’ll be passionately recommending.
I absolutely loved Blum’s writing style, I love how much is written between the lines, it makes for a fascinating character study. The raw humanity she presents in this book is breathtaking, that was my favorite aspect of it.
The story itself falls a bit flat for me. It needed to either be trimmed down or expanded on in my opinion. It sits in this weird in-between zone wherein it feels like not quite the final draft.
So 3.5 for me, but I’ll round up to 4.
I absolutely loved Blum’s writing style, I love how much is written between the lines, it makes for a fascinating character study. The raw humanity she presents in this book is breathtaking, that was my favorite aspect of it.
The story itself falls a bit flat for me. It needed to either be trimmed down or expanded on in my opinion. It sits in this weird in-between zone wherein it feels like not quite the final draft.
So 3.5 for me, but I’ll round up to 4.
emotional
reflective
fast-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
Complicated
Loveable characters:
Complicated
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
prose was alright, i'd be interested to know what impact the translation had. i read it quick, and while knowing that the mother was an unreliable narrator i didn't think too deeply about what she had said - though began to do so more when conflict began to ripple in her flashbacks. interesting to read about a parent desperately grasping at their adult child's life, though, as the adult child on the other side of the canyon.
As the mother of an almost teenager, I found this book to be deeply disturbing, hitting close to some fundamental insecurities as a parent.
The book portrays a familiar daily parenting dilemma—how much can/should we do to help our children? How much is too much? When (and how?) do we let go? And when events in their life take a turn, when they make bad decisions, how do we guide them through?
The book sent me scrambling for interpretations and author insight. Hila Blum shared this on NPR: “And as a relatively new parent, I guess I was overwhelmed by what seemed like really an infinite number of daily decisions that parenting demanded. Some were really tiny. Some were enormous - but always decisions, decisions. And I was struck by the impossibility of predicting the accumulating long-term effect of all that. And I was thinking about how parents, you know, driven by emotions that they recognize to be love and by intentions that they perceive to be good and reasons that they perceive to be right - they can still sometimes arrive at doing a very wrong thing. And I was concerned by the potential of seemingly benign intentions to lead to miserable outcomes.” https://www.npr.org/2023/07/25/1190062467/how-to-love-your-daughter-according-to-this-author
The book portrays a familiar daily parenting dilemma—how much can/should we do to help our children? How much is too much? When (and how?) do we let go? And when events in their life take a turn, when they make bad decisions, how do we guide them through?
The book sent me scrambling for interpretations and author insight. Hila Blum shared this on NPR: “And as a relatively new parent, I guess I was overwhelmed by what seemed like really an infinite number of daily decisions that parenting demanded. Some were really tiny. Some were enormous - but always decisions, decisions. And I was struck by the impossibility of predicting the accumulating long-term effect of all that. And I was thinking about how parents, you know, driven by emotions that they recognize to be love and by intentions that they perceive to be good and reasons that they perceive to be right - they can still sometimes arrive at doing a very wrong thing. And I was concerned by the potential of seemingly benign intentions to lead to miserable outcomes.” https://www.npr.org/2023/07/25/1190062467/how-to-love-your-daughter-according-to-this-author
In the beginning of the book, a mother hides outside the house where her estranged daughter lives, looking through the window at her, and the granddaughters she never met. The scene immediately pulls me in. I, as a reader, follow the woman from her pregnancy, to the daughter’s childhood, then to young girl’s the tumultuous teenage years, along the way glimpse into the woman’s own upbringing, mariage, relationship with her mother, and various mental breakdowns. The seemingly inexplicable estrangement gradually becomes clear. What has she done to deserve such pain? Perhaps nothing. Perhaps a lot. A single wrong move, life is lost and love turns cold. But is it truly a once-off mistake? Has the daughter been suffocated by the mother’s love for a long time?
Psychologically deep. Snippets of real books scatter among the pages, mostly about mother daughter relationships by female authors–Alice Munro, Margaret Atwood, Elizabeth Strout, to name a few. Readers read books the protagonist reads, which creates breaks in the flow. The effect is strange.
The story is sad not just because of the mother daughter estrangement, but more of the inescapable fate. The author gives the mother and daughter the same personality: obsession, and the daughter repeats the mother’s fate.
Psychologically deep. Snippets of real books scatter among the pages, mostly about mother daughter relationships by female authors–Alice Munro, Margaret Atwood, Elizabeth Strout, to name a few. Readers read books the protagonist reads, which creates breaks in the flow. The effect is strange.
The story is sad not just because of the mother daughter estrangement, but more of the inescapable fate. The author gives the mother and daughter the same personality: obsession, and the daughter repeats the mother’s fate.
Wow. This was almost 5 stars for sure but.... there were.... a couple more things I NEEDED!!
This book is told from Yoella's point of view; she is an Israeli woman who has not seen her adult daughter, Leah, in 6 years, and has never met her granddaughters. She doesn't understand why Leah won't contact her, since she believes they had a great relationship all her life. The book jumps back and forth between the present day, when Yoella has found out where Leah lives and is spying on her family, and Leah's childhood, where we can look for clues as to what went wrong.
I forget what it's called, but that trope of well-meaning parents inadvertently ruining their relationship with their kids by doing what THEY think is best... I find this very haunting. I was reading other reviews, and someone likened it to a part in Pachinko, where a similar well-meaning parental action leads to... the worst outcome imaginable. I loved Pachinko, you should read it.
I was immediately sucked in by the beautiful writing. I also appreciate very short chapters. I flew through this.
This book is told from Yoella's point of view; she is an Israeli woman who has not seen her adult daughter, Leah, in 6 years, and has never met her granddaughters. She doesn't understand why Leah won't contact her, since she believes they had a great relationship all her life. The book jumps back and forth between the present day, when Yoella has found out where Leah lives and is spying on her family, and Leah's childhood, where we can look for clues as to what went wrong.
I forget what it's called, but that trope of well-meaning parents inadvertently ruining their relationship with their kids by doing what THEY think is best... I find this very haunting. I was reading other reviews, and someone likened it to a part in Pachinko, where a similar well-meaning parental action leads to... the worst outcome imaginable. I loved Pachinko, you should read it.
Spoiler
But I was shocked at the abrupt ending!! There was so much build up and I was on the edge of my seat waiting for what would happen! When I clicked to the next page and saw the acknowledgments I was like noooooooo what happens what happens what happens. I also desperately need Leah's point of view! I understand the unreliable narrator thing yada yada, it's cool, but in this case omg I just NEEDED to know how she was interpreting things.I was immediately sucked in by the beautiful writing. I also appreciate very short chapters. I flew through this.
I am not sure how to feel about this book. I have read about the concept of "missing missing reasons" and the fact that often parents say they don't know why their children cut contact, when in fact they know, they just can't accept the children's reasons.
I think I expected something more in that vein, clearer scenes of where the daughter is hurt by the mother's behaviour but the mother doesn't realize how bad it is, little things adding up. There's maybe some of that too, but there's mostly also one big event.
So there's a lot of "story" that doesn't really lead to anything - I didn't mind that much but it also wasn't a fulfilling read. I feel like I want something more, but at the same time I think adding another perspective or more time would ruin the way the book is now, like the frustration is intentional.
I actually enjoyed the way it jumped back and forth between different time lines, but I didn't enjoy the writing in itself that much. The references to many other books also kind of put me off - it didn't feel like quotes themselves added that much and for the one book referenced I did read, I feel like the character's takeaway from that story was very warped (but again, maybe intentional).
I think I expected something more in that vein, clearer scenes of where the daughter is hurt by the mother's behaviour but the mother doesn't realize how bad it is, little things adding up. There's maybe some of that too, but there's mostly also one big event.
So there's a lot of "story" that doesn't really lead to anything - I didn't mind that much but it also wasn't a fulfilling read. I feel like I want something more, but at the same time I think adding another perspective or more time would ruin the way the book is now, like the frustration is intentional.
I actually enjoyed the way it jumped back and forth between different time lines, but I didn't enjoy the writing in itself that much. The references to many other books also kind of put me off - it didn't feel like quotes themselves added that much and for the one book referenced I did read, I feel like the character's takeaway from that story was very warped (but again, maybe intentional).
I’m not a mother but this was beautiful. The writing style is stunning (I can’t believe this was an English translation?) and the narrative weaving seemingly across both time and space adds to the experience of reading this. Typically a time jump can feel basic but in this case it really just gives the feeling of reading someone’s stream of consciousness thoughts, or almost like a journal completely out of order. It doesn’t come to some knockout conclusion, nor does it at any point reveal anything earth shattering, it’s just like a fully realized thought experiment about what it means to be a woman in the world - mother, wife, daughter, co-worker, friend - full of emotion.