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limeywesty 's review for:
The Twelve Tribes of Hattie
by Ayana Mathis
How do you prepare your children for a world you know is cruel?
Fifteen years old with only the hope for a better life, Hattie Shepherd leaves the American South for Philadelphia. Sixteen and pregnant with twins, Hattie’s American dream is shattered time and time again; a cheating husband, raising nine children in poverty, discrimination and decimating heartbreak.
The narrative of Hattie in this novel is chronological, however, each chapter is her children’s stories, their tenderness or steeliness to her tough exterior reflected in their own trials and tribulations. Whilst this provides fresh eyes and engaging yarns, I feel this way of story telling has separated us from the character that matters most, whose hardship is most painful. In the first chapter, something utterly devastating occurs. If I had known Hattie better as a reader, I would have been in floods of tears. This feeling followed me through the entire novel. I was too removed from the emotions to feel anything more visceral than sympathy.
Whilst this is a peculiar Oprah Book Club selection-no self help or Eckhart Tolle here, this is a profoundly compassionate American debut and a tale that might bring you to your knees.
Fifteen years old with only the hope for a better life, Hattie Shepherd leaves the American South for Philadelphia. Sixteen and pregnant with twins, Hattie’s American dream is shattered time and time again; a cheating husband, raising nine children in poverty, discrimination and decimating heartbreak.
The narrative of Hattie in this novel is chronological, however, each chapter is her children’s stories, their tenderness or steeliness to her tough exterior reflected in their own trials and tribulations. Whilst this provides fresh eyes and engaging yarns, I feel this way of story telling has separated us from the character that matters most, whose hardship is most painful. In the first chapter, something utterly devastating occurs. If I had known Hattie better as a reader, I would have been in floods of tears. This feeling followed me through the entire novel. I was too removed from the emotions to feel anything more visceral than sympathy.
Whilst this is a peculiar Oprah Book Club selection-no self help or Eckhart Tolle here, this is a profoundly compassionate American debut and a tale that might bring you to your knees.