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A review by jcstokes95
All You Knead Is Love by Tanya Guerrero
4.0
[3.5/5]
A warm, filling book with decadent food descriptions and a trilingual glossary; what more can you ask for? Our main character feels very real and distinctly pre-teen in her emotions. Alba's habit of running away and her easily flipped emotions feel not only very 12 years old but very child living through trauma. It's pretty amazing to me to see how much more deeply middle grade books cover the tough stuff and how much more representative of all groups they can be from when I was young.
I wish we had gotten to spend more time with Alba and her mom talking through what it meant for Alba specifically to live through an abusive situation. I feel trauma like that takes a lifetime to recover from and wish at times that had a bit more time to steam. I will say, I appreciate the total absence of the father from the book which really makes this a great piece about healing. I feel like many young reader books dealing with abuse have a second act where a sense of violence returns, and I really love that instead, we get to just live in Alba's head while she grows up and finds her footing.
This definitely feels like a more mature middle grade book, whatever that means to you. I'm not going to tell an 11 year old what to read, but it does feel like it skews older with it's references to finding a passion, romance subplot and the pop culture references. But, this was a thoroughly enjoyable read with a whole lot of heart.
[2021 Popsugar Reading Challenge #33- A book featuring three generations (grandparent, parent, child)]
A warm, filling book with decadent food descriptions and a trilingual glossary; what more can you ask for? Our main character feels very real and distinctly pre-teen in her emotions. Alba's habit of running away and her easily flipped emotions feel not only very 12 years old but very child living through trauma. It's pretty amazing to me to see how much more deeply middle grade books cover the tough stuff and how much more representative of all groups they can be from when I was young.
I wish we had gotten to spend more time with Alba and her mom talking through what it meant for Alba specifically to live through an abusive situation. I feel trauma like that takes a lifetime to recover from and wish at times that had a bit more time to steam. I will say, I appreciate the total absence of the father from the book which really makes this a great piece about healing. I feel like many young reader books dealing with abuse have a second act where a sense of violence returns, and I really love that instead, we get to just live in Alba's head while she grows up and finds her footing.
This definitely feels like a more mature middle grade book, whatever that means to you. I'm not going to tell an 11 year old what to read, but it does feel like it skews older with it's references to finding a passion, romance subplot and the pop culture references. But, this was a thoroughly enjoyable read with a whole lot of heart.
[2021 Popsugar Reading Challenge #33- A book featuring three generations (grandparent, parent, child)]