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A review by thewellreadrunner
A Heart of Stone by Renate Dorrestein
3.0
I'll start this review by stating very clearly that this is not a good book to pick up if you dislike reading about violence against children/babies. New moms might have an especially hard time. I wish I had known this beforehand, because I might have skipped it as a result, but the book description really doesn't tell you enough to figure that out beforehand.
This book is basically about Ellen, now an adult, but when she was 12 her mother developed postpartum psychosis after the birth of her baby sister. The details of her terrifying childhood unfold throughout the book as she tries to comes to grips with her past.
Overall, this book was likeable in style/writing. It took me a bit to get used to how Dorrestein jumped from past to present, sometimes on the same page with very little warning. But once I figured out the style, I did enjoy it. And Ellen's character is rather complex--if you take her adult character on its own, she is difficult to like, but when you add in all the details of her childhood, it makes you want to be more sympathetic towards her. I didn't feel that the "revelation" at the end was earth-shattering, but it was fitting with the rest of the plot.
The only thing that really kept me from giving this more stars is that the subject matter is SO disturbing, and not knowing that at all beforehand made this a difficult read for me. I am not lying when I say that I put the book down multiple times just so I could go stare at my son while he slept. The book is not for the faint of heart. If you don't mind that, you'll probably love it, because at its core it is a very interesting story.
This book is basically about Ellen, now an adult, but when she was 12 her mother developed postpartum psychosis after the birth of her baby sister. The details of her terrifying childhood unfold throughout the book as she tries to comes to grips with her past.
Overall, this book was likeable in style/writing. It took me a bit to get used to how Dorrestein jumped from past to present, sometimes on the same page with very little warning. But once I figured out the style, I did enjoy it. And Ellen's character is rather complex--if you take her adult character on its own, she is difficult to like, but when you add in all the details of her childhood, it makes you want to be more sympathetic towards her. I didn't feel that the "revelation" at the end was earth-shattering, but it was fitting with the rest of the plot.
The only thing that really kept me from giving this more stars is that the subject matter is SO disturbing, and not knowing that at all beforehand made this a difficult read for me. I am not lying when I say that I put the book down multiple times just so I could go stare at my son while he slept. The book is not for the faint of heart. If you don't mind that, you'll probably love it, because at its core it is a very interesting story.