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A review by melbsreads
The Exiled by Kati Hiekkapelto
4.0
Trigger warnings: murder, ethnic slurs (a lot of the book revolves around the Romani community), cheating, kidnapping, death of a parent (in the past), refugee experiences.
3.5 stars.
I don't think I've ever read anything translated from Finnish before, and I certainly didn't expect it to be set in Serbia, with large chunks of the conversation happening in Hungarian, and with a lot of the story involving refugee and Romani characters.
There were things that I liked about this - the friendships, the insight into the way Yugoslavia fell apart and the impact that had on the population - but there were also things I wasn't particularly keen on. Anna's repeated "Oh crap, I still haven't gone to get a new passport" thing was kind of infuriating simply because it seemed like it happened at least twice a day and yet SHE NEVER FREAKING DID THE THING. I didn't like the fact that she ended up in a relationship with a man who'd literally JUST separated from his wife.
And I found it slightly baffling that the blurb uses the English style First Name Surname format for the characters when the text uses Surname First Name, and it honestly took me a while to work out who various characters were because I'd pay attention to the first part of their name when they were introduced and then it wouldn't show up again and I'd be all "Wait, who's this person??" until I finally twigged about 175 pages in. Whoops?
Overall, I enjoyed this despite those few struggles and I'd definitely pick up another book by this author in the future.
3.5 stars.
I don't think I've ever read anything translated from Finnish before, and I certainly didn't expect it to be set in Serbia, with large chunks of the conversation happening in Hungarian, and with a lot of the story involving refugee and Romani characters.
There were things that I liked about this - the friendships, the insight into the way Yugoslavia fell apart and the impact that had on the population - but there were also things I wasn't particularly keen on. Anna's repeated "Oh crap, I still haven't gone to get a new passport" thing was kind of infuriating simply because it seemed like it happened at least twice a day and yet SHE NEVER FREAKING DID THE THING. I didn't like the fact that she ended up in a relationship with a man who'd literally JUST separated from his wife.
And I found it slightly baffling that the blurb uses the English style First Name Surname format for the characters when the text uses Surname First Name, and it honestly took me a while to work out who various characters were because I'd pay attention to the first part of their name when they were introduced and then it wouldn't show up again and I'd be all "Wait, who's this person??" until I finally twigged about 175 pages in. Whoops?
Overall, I enjoyed this despite those few struggles and I'd definitely pick up another book by this author in the future.