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goodem9199's review against another edition
4.0
Wow...for a debut novelist this was fantastic. Celona's writing seems so fine-tuned that I would have mistaken her for having many more titles under her belt. I loved the way this book waffled back and forth between time periods, ultimatly meeting up at the end. Fantastic. Can't wait to read more from her.
categj's review against another edition
4.0
Marjorie Celona's debut novel Y is a beautifully written story about love, loss and belonging. The tale opens in the early hours of the morning as a young woman abandons her newborn daughter on the steps of the Victoria YMCA.
The book is written in two narratives with Shannon, in alternating chapters, tracing her life from birth through her adolescence and sharing the story of her mother, Yula, beginning a few days before her daughters birth and the tragedy leading up to the scene at the YMCA, where she set down her newborn, wrapped in an old, grey sweatshirt, and walks swiftly away without looking back.
Shannon’s story is a typical tale of a child thrust into the social services system, constantly moving from foster home to foster home all the while feeling lost, alone — a misfit everywhere she lands. Her wildly curly white-blond hair, her one blind eye and small stature only serve to emphasize her difference from those around her.
Eventually, Shannon is taken in by Miranda a single-mother with a daughter, Lydia-Rose. As Shannon strives to find a way to fit into this little family, she is hindered by an overwhelming desire to discover the answers to her many questions — "Where did I come from? Who are my parents and especially — Why did my mother abandon me? "
Shannon's longing to find her place in the world pushes her to embark upon a search for identity and belonging and along the way she finds that the answers to her big questions sometimes leads to surprising endings.
Ms. Celona's writing creates a compelling, bittersweet picture of the age-old desire to be a part of something, to know where we come from and why life unfolds as it does. Her characters, in this novel, are very real and their emotions and actions feel familiar. The novel is eminently readable and while the story is very sad, there is a sense of hope that permeates throughout, notwithstanding the book’s darkest moments.
The book is written in two narratives with Shannon, in alternating chapters, tracing her life from birth through her adolescence and sharing the story of her mother, Yula, beginning a few days before her daughters birth and the tragedy leading up to the scene at the YMCA, where she set down her newborn, wrapped in an old, grey sweatshirt, and walks swiftly away without looking back.
Shannon’s story is a typical tale of a child thrust into the social services system, constantly moving from foster home to foster home all the while feeling lost, alone — a misfit everywhere she lands. Her wildly curly white-blond hair, her one blind eye and small stature only serve to emphasize her difference from those around her.
Eventually, Shannon is taken in by Miranda a single-mother with a daughter, Lydia-Rose. As Shannon strives to find a way to fit into this little family, she is hindered by an overwhelming desire to discover the answers to her many questions — "Where did I come from? Who are my parents and especially — Why did my mother abandon me? "
Shannon's longing to find her place in the world pushes her to embark upon a search for identity and belonging and along the way she finds that the answers to her big questions sometimes leads to surprising endings.
Ms. Celona's writing creates a compelling, bittersweet picture of the age-old desire to be a part of something, to know where we come from and why life unfolds as it does. Her characters, in this novel, are very real and their emotions and actions feel familiar. The novel is eminently readable and while the story is very sad, there is a sense of hope that permeates throughout, notwithstanding the book’s darkest moments.
mschrock8's review against another edition
4.0
My first FREE BOOK from Good Reads giveaways!
Sad & lonely story, & I am enjoying it.
Upon completion: Still sad & lonely. Shannon is a strong girl, & she figures out a lot of things. I wonder how many children are left to wander, given a similar situation? Makes me very grateful for the family life I had growing up & the home I give my teen-aged daughter now.
This book is well-written. I would enjoy reading more by this author.
Thank you, Good Reads for the opportunity to discover this book & this author.
Sad & lonely story, & I am enjoying it.
Upon completion: Still sad & lonely. Shannon is a strong girl, & she figures out a lot of things. I wonder how many children are left to wander, given a similar situation? Makes me very grateful for the family life I had growing up & the home I give my teen-aged daughter now.
This book is well-written. I would enjoy reading more by this author.
Thank you, Good Reads for the opportunity to discover this book & this author.
jazzymom's review against another edition
3.0
Started out a little slow, but picked up towards the middle.
kdurham2's review against another edition
3.0
Check out the full review at Kritters Ramblings
Two storylines going at the same time and at the most critical moment they will intersect and bring the story all together. One centers around Shannon who is a young girl that has spent all of her young life bouncing from house to house in the foster care system as she is left on the steps of a YMCA as a newborn. The other storyline is the story she is narrating about the days leading up to her birth that stars her mom and father and extended family.
Two storylines going at the same time and at the most critical moment they will intersect and bring the story all together. One centers around Shannon who is a young girl that has spent all of her young life bouncing from house to house in the foster care system as she is left on the steps of a YMCA as a newborn. The other storyline is the story she is narrating about the days leading up to her birth that stars her mom and father and extended family.
whichthreewords's review against another edition
3.0
Not bad YA, although it did drag a bit and felt a little over-constructed. A pretty good depiction of a low-grade attachment disorder, I thought.
lw_304's review against another edition
4.0
Probably 3.5*. I enjoyed the storyline it it seemed to drag a bit in parts. I did feel there was good closure.
lisalikesdogs's review against another edition
4.0
This book was just really lovely. Along the lines of Lullabies for Little Criminals (though admittedly less fabulous, but still good).
joyousreads132's review against another edition
4.0
Truth be told, I wrote this book off as something that was slightly out of my intellectual reach. Even if the story sounded simple enough, I'm shamed to say that I didn't get it.
I had a completely different opinion after I read it the first time. I was unable to get over myself. See, I get so comfortable with my reading choices that when a book this jarring comes my way, I freeze. I don't know what to do with myself. I've been so stubbornly set on how a character should act or how her story should've been written that when an author writes something incredibly real, I'm unable to react.
I've been trying to finish this book for more than a month now. And I've asked myself fruitlessly on numerous times why I've exerted the effort. The only reason I could come up with is that I've been intrigued by this book ever since I came across it last year. I must admit that while reading this novel, I wondered what makes someone's work critically-acclaimed. And man, I didn't get it. I realized at some point why I can't quit my day job just yet. Because if I can't differentiate an award winning novel from the prosaic, then there's no point of entertaining my life-long dream of doing this for a living.
I should mention that perhaps I am just not ready for this mature, quest-for-oneself's-identity type of story. It had evoked empathy that would probably be more jostling to mothers like me. If there's anyone who could tell us a tale of self discovery, it would be a baby abandoned at the doors of a Y. I was expecting some pretty harrowing tales of living out the horrors of the foster care system in Canada. But there wasn't much of that. The most disheartening story was when she was but a toddler in the hands of an abusive foster dad. Other than that, you could say that she had better luck that most. Right now, in my city, a trial is in progress for the murder of a four year old girl in the hands of her mother and her boyfriend. She's been in and out of the foster care system and had finally ended her short life full of abuse when her mother and the boyfriend beat her to death. The system is under fire because they somehow missed the signs. The point is, there are a lot of horror stories out there and Shannon may have been lucky to a degree.
Shannon was pretty restless and living in all four seasons of her discontent. She struggled to find herself in a world where nothing seemed right; where she couldn't find her rightful place. It's difficult to do that if you don't know where you came from. That, in its essence, is Shannon's quest: to know the reason why a mother would give up a child without knowing whether or not she'd end up with a good life. She didn't want a life with her biological mother, she just wanted to know.
There were stories of teenage angst and rebellion of the lighter kind. There were encounters with drug addicts, alcoholics and homeless hobos. Even if the foster family who took her in offered her some sort of stability, she couldn't quite settle. So she goes and finds her past starting with the man who found her at the Y.
And then there's the story of her mother (Yula), who incidentally was a child herself. Her story was heartbreaking, her first child's even more so. She loved the way she knew how - pure and all encompassing and to a fault. Victim of circumstance and the environment around her, leaving Shannon's fate in the mercy of strangers was her way giving her second child a fighting chance. In the end, and whatever her state of mind was at the time, I really couldn't fault or admonished her for committing all her unforgivable sins. In the end, it was her love that made her do what she needed to do.
It's a story of a girl
left on the steps of a Y.
Growing up listlessly
wondering hopelessly why.
An infant aware
soon as she opened her eyes.
A violent birth
and the impending demise.
Days turned to years
in wonder and impatience.
Nothing could ground her,
and thought that
love's an indulgence.
She's wary of anyone
who might show her compassion.
Always defensive,
second guessing their intentions.
To those who love her
fully and honestly.
She's out of reach
all closed up tightly.
A slip of a girl
with one blinded eye.
Stronger than she looks
for a four foot nothing high.
She draws her strength
in knowing that she survived,
the violent birth
and in love she had thrived.
I had a completely different opinion after I read it the first time. I was unable to get over myself. See, I get so comfortable with my reading choices that when a book this jarring comes my way, I freeze. I don't know what to do with myself. I've been so stubbornly set on how a character should act or how her story should've been written that when an author writes something incredibly real, I'm unable to react.
I've been trying to finish this book for more than a month now. And I've asked myself fruitlessly on numerous times why I've exerted the effort. The only reason I could come up with is that I've been intrigued by this book ever since I came across it last year. I must admit that while reading this novel, I wondered what makes someone's work critically-acclaimed. And man, I didn't get it. I realized at some point why I can't quit my day job just yet. Because if I can't differentiate an award winning novel from the prosaic, then there's no point of entertaining my life-long dream of doing this for a living.
I should mention that perhaps I am just not ready for this mature, quest-for-oneself's-identity type of story. It had evoked empathy that would probably be more jostling to mothers like me. If there's anyone who could tell us a tale of self discovery, it would be a baby abandoned at the doors of a Y. I was expecting some pretty harrowing tales of living out the horrors of the foster care system in Canada. But there wasn't much of that. The most disheartening story was when she was but a toddler in the hands of an abusive foster dad. Other than that, you could say that she had better luck that most. Right now, in my city, a trial is in progress for the murder of a four year old girl in the hands of her mother and her boyfriend. She's been in and out of the foster care system and had finally ended her short life full of abuse when her mother and the boyfriend beat her to death. The system is under fire because they somehow missed the signs. The point is, there are a lot of horror stories out there and Shannon may have been lucky to a degree.
Shannon was pretty restless and living in all four seasons of her discontent. She struggled to find herself in a world where nothing seemed right; where she couldn't find her rightful place. It's difficult to do that if you don't know where you came from. That, in its essence, is Shannon's quest: to know the reason why a mother would give up a child without knowing whether or not she'd end up with a good life. She didn't want a life with her biological mother, she just wanted to know.
There were stories of teenage angst and rebellion of the lighter kind. There were encounters with drug addicts, alcoholics and homeless hobos. Even if the foster family who took her in offered her some sort of stability, she couldn't quite settle. So she goes and finds her past starting with the man who found her at the Y.
And then there's the story of her mother (Yula), who incidentally was a child herself. Her story was heartbreaking, her first child's even more so. She loved the way she knew how - pure and all encompassing and to a fault. Victim of circumstance and the environment around her, leaving Shannon's fate in the mercy of strangers was her way giving her second child a fighting chance. In the end, and whatever her state of mind was at the time, I really couldn't fault or admonished her for committing all her unforgivable sins. In the end, it was her love that made her do what she needed to do.
It's a story of a girl
left on the steps of a Y.
Growing up listlessly
wondering hopelessly why.
An infant aware
soon as she opened her eyes.
A violent birth
and the impending demise.
Days turned to years
in wonder and impatience.
Nothing could ground her,
and thought that
love's an indulgence.
She's wary of anyone
who might show her compassion.
Always defensive,
second guessing their intentions.
To those who love her
fully and honestly.
She's out of reach
all closed up tightly.
A slip of a girl
with one blinded eye.
Stronger than she looks
for a four foot nothing high.
She draws her strength
in knowing that she survived,
the violent birth
and in love she had thrived.
butterfly2507's review against another edition
1.0
Meine Review:
http://butterflyyintheskyy.blogspot.com/2013/03/hier-konnte-ich-zur-welt-kommen.html
http://butterflyyintheskyy.blogspot.com/2013/03/hier-konnte-ich-zur-welt-kommen.html