A review by han_reads_13579
The Madwoman of Serrano by Dina Salustio

3.0

I have very mixed feelings about this. I loved the beginning. The story of the tiny village of Serrano in Cape Verde. Particularly the stories of the women of the village: the midwives, the madwoman, Gremiana. I loved Jerónimo and Fernanda's story and young Filipa. I cared much less for the stories of the city dwellers. Older Filipa's endless droning on about the details of her hotel business and her various foster family members were quite a drag for me and I had to put it aside for a couple of months. It should have been a good contrast between the two very different ways of life and sets of characters; but I don't think the book was well balanced enough to achieve this. I also found it a little offensive the way that the villagers were often referred to as being lesser than the city folk. Less intelligent, foolish and simple minded. I struggled to look past this. But I'm glad I came back to it and finished what is, no doubt, a very interesting and unusual book and another step on my journey of reading women around the world