Reviews tagging 'Mental illness'

Salt Houses by Hala Alyan

3 reviews

morethanmylupus's review against another edition

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hopeful 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? It's complicated

4.0

Beautiful, timely, and heartbreaking.

Salt Houses is a family saga that follows Aila and her family from the Nakba through to nearly the present day. We see triumphs and disappointments as they do their best to survive. For me, the biggest impact of this book was the generational trauma that started with the Nakba and how it continued to impact their lives even as they moved across continents. 
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yourbookishbff's review

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challenging emotional funny 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? It's complicated

5.0

Salt Houses, by Hala Alyan, traces four generations of Palestinians through exile - from Palestine to Kuwait, Jordan, Lebanon, Paris and Boston. Where multi-generational sagas always feel epic, this story is also painfully intimate. It’s a story filled with ghosts - of Palestine, of family members murdered or imprisoned or lost to time and distance and bitterness, of all the things we are too scared to say out loud to the people we love. The lives and love of Alia and Atef anchor the story, and we see their childhoods and young love, their deep trauma during the Six-Day War and subsequent flight to Kuwait, their early marriage with young children, the ceaseless displacement, the restless moves from country to country as they try to build lives free of war and occupation. Spinning out from them, we see their children and grandchildren with inherited trauma and grief fighting for reclamation and joy. This is a diaspora story where “houses as old as the earth itself” are replaced by “structures made of salt.”

And woven throughout each generation are moments of raw tenderness that boldly refute the dehumanization and violent caricaturization of Arab men we’ve witnessed through the last several decades. Instead: Mustafa, cradling a baby bird for his sister. Mustafa, practicing a speech for hours to get it just right. Mustafa, released from prison, kneeling to kiss his mother’s feet as he whispers never again. Atef making wishes to the moon with Riham. Atef drinking tea in the garden every afternoon with his daughter. Karam calming his mother’s fears and his sister’s anger. Zain reeling in Linah’s wild temper and restlessness. Alyan whispering to us: see this, and this, and this. Every life, an entire universe. 
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bookedbymadeline's review against another edition

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dark emotional hopeful reflective sad medium-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? A mix
  • Strong character development? It's complicated
  • Loveable characters? It's complicated
  • Diverse cast of characters? Yes
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.5

My second book from Alyan and loved it! Her writing style and characters are always beautifully done with lyrical prose. I enjoyed the switching POVs going through time from the 60s to 2014 as we follow one family. Alyan will definitely be an auto buy author for me!
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