THISTLEFOOT – GennaRose Nethercott

“May there always be wine, may there always be smokes, may the jesters be kings and the kings become jokes.”

“I do not want you to think that what comes after is your fault. I do not want you to think that the ending could have been changed. It is not your fault. It is not your fault. It is not mine, nor Baba Yaga’s, nor her daughters’, nor Haim’s, nor any of the market sellers’ faults.  It is not our fault. Please, please remember, when the time for remembering comes.  The fault, I beg you, I beg you, the fault is not our own.”

GennaRose Nethercott is a folklorist and poet.  Thistlefoot (Anchor Books 2022) is her first novel, and oh what a beauty of a debut it is. I love the art and tradition of storytelling, and Thistlefoot is love letter to tradition, to the folktales, legends, and lore that are wrapped in history and memory and ghosts that still thrum in our bones even if we only remember them in nursery rhymes.  Our blood sings with stories – it always has – and this novel is so clever, beautiful, and powerful.

A modern Baba Yaga retelling, the novel centers around the Yaga siblings and a surprising inheritance from Ukraine.  Before receiving their inheritance, both siblings are struggling.  Isaac, the Chameleon King, is living life as a vagabond, trading faces and conning his way across the US, his only companion a black cat named Hubcap that he cannot shake.  Bellatine lives a rigid and structured existence – it’s the only way to control the “Embering,” a magic that courses through her blood, burning and tingling her fingers. They’re both broken people, wrapped up in grief and guilt, and both so alone.  When their inheritance arrives, a walking house on legs that they call Thistlefoot, they are thrown back together. 

Bellatine wants the house.  Isaac agrees to give it to her provided she agree to take the house on tour, resurrecting the family tradition of puppetry and conducting shows across the US for a year.  And so the siblings sets off.  But they’re not alone.  The Longshadow Man, a terrifying man of mayhem and destruction, has following the house from Eastern Europe and he continues to pursue it and the Yaga siblings.  He wants the house, and he wants it and its stories and history to burn.

The novel is a wonderfully crafted folktale within a folktale that reminds the reader how important stories are.  “An ember to lead you through the dark.”

“Raise the lantern.”

“Kill the ghost.”

Read this book.

THE INHERTIANCE OF ORQUIDEA DIVINA – Zoraida Córdova

“She was the mouth of an ancient god who would swallow the world.  She was an ocean of stories, memories, thousands of little moments that made up her whole being.”

Zoraida Córdova’s The Inheritance of Orquídea Divina (Atria Books 2021) is an absolute delight of a novel.  It’s House of Spirits meets Practical Magic meets Big Fish meets Encanto. There’s magic and mystery, family drama and secrets, ghosts and monsters.  Steeped in magical realism and biting with sharp and witty dialogue, the novel was not at all what I expected.  The cover, while gorgeous and expected with magical realism, doesn’t show the humor and heart that made this work so brilliant.

Orquídea, the Montoya family matriarch (and yes, The Princess Bride is referenced) has never left her home in Four Rivers since she appeared there.  She married and buried multiple husbands, and raised several children and grandchildren in the house she built.  The house is full of magic, protected with spells and enchantments.  But the children outgrow their belief in magic and began to see her not as a powerful witch, but just a bitter old lady.  Those that survived, scattered – leaving her alone.  But Orquídea sends them an invitation to her death, urging them to come collect their inheritance.  And they come.  Only she doesn’t die, she turns into a tree after leaving the house to her granddaughter, Mari.  The house promptly burns down after a family fight.

Marimar never knew her father and her mother drowned when she was a teen.  She blamed Orquídea for not protecting her mother, and she fled to New York and lived with an aunt and her cousin Rey.  While there are numerous cousins, Mari, Rey, and Tatinelly carry the present-day story.  They are marked with magic when Orquídea dies/transforms.  Tatinelly gives birth in the house while chaos ensues, and the child is marked as well.

Seven years pass, and something is hunting the family.  Mari, Rey, Tati and her daughter, Rhiannon, set out to Ecuador to find out Orquídea’s secrets so that they can stop whatever is hellbent on killing them all.

The novel is told in dual timelines, slipping into Orquídea’s childhood and her running away to join a sideshow circus where one of the exhibits is an actual Living Star, having fallen from the sky and been captured. The Star, and his magic, are controlled by Orquídea’s first husband.  A toxic love story unfolds, and a plan is hatched for both of their escapes.

This novel thrums with the sound of grasshoppers and hummingbird wings.  It smells like fresh dirt and roses, and it tastes like salt from the sea.  It sings with love and magic, the blood the binds, and the family we choose.

Read this book.

BRONZE DRUM – Phong Nguyen

“Gather around, children of Chu Diên, and be brave.  For even to listen to the story of the Tru’ng Sisters is, in these troubled times, a dangerous act.”

The bones of Phong Nguyen’s Bronze Drum (Grand Central Publishing 2022) were exhilarating; it was an easy BOTM pick for me.  Historical fiction, cloaked in myth and lore, of two sisters in 40 CE ancient Việt Nam, who sparked a revolution – an army of women who rose up against the Hán Chinese in a battle for independence – the bronze drum, the sound of their battle cry and the symbol of their victory, that was banned following their fall.  I was so excited to start this one, and I tried so hard to like it.  But I’m going to need someone else to give the Tru’ng Sisters a voice; this was poorly executed, and the sisters, the glorious She-Kings, were poorly developed.  The novel cannot decide what it wants to be and not settling down one path, ends up clumsy and frustrating.  (There’s also a typo where “battle” is spelled “batttle,” and it’s driving me bonkers.)

I am grateful this novel introduced me to the Tru’ng Sisters and their army of women, including the badass archers from the mountains.  The image of the sisters riding into battle on elephants while bronze drums are played to alert the soldiers as to formation and attack strategy is extremely powerful.  The women joining forces to kill the tiger that has ravaged their village for years and writing their declaration on its hide is the kind of scene that will stick with the reader long after the last page.  But these powerful moments are very rare, and the novel doesn’t breathe with the beat of the drum or the heartbeat of the women who fought so hard.

The sisters deserved better.

BEASTS OF PREY – Ayana Gray

Ayana Gray’s Beasts of Prey (Putnam 2021) has been hanging out on my TBR since Christmas.  Following Children of Blood and Bone (we won’t discuss the second installment in *that* series), I developed an appreciation for Pan-African young adult fantasy novels, and there are elements of Beasts of Prey that remind me of Children of Blood and Bone, the Tristan Strong trilogy, Skin of the Sea, and The Gilded Ones.  I find great pleasure in these books that are tossing the fantasy canon ass over tea kettle and giving us the folklore, mythology and magic that has been long absent in the publishing industry.

Beasts of Prey is Gray’s debut novel, and the second installment has been published, but it hasn’t made its way to the TBR cart.  Yet.  I will read Beasts of Ruin eventually, but those follow-up installments can be tricky. 

Told in dual timelines, Beasts follows Adiah, a powerful daraja, who is learning to use and control splendor (magic), but she is frustrated and easily manipulated.  One hundred years later, Koffi and Ekon live in a world without magic (or so they think) but with stories about what ruptured the sky.  An unlikely pair, Koffi and Ekon join forces to hunt the Shetani, a monster in the jungle who is killing people.  Koffi needs to capture the beast to free herself, her mother and a dear friend from servitude.  Ekon needs to kill or capture the beast to restore honor to his name so that he can be appointed as a warrior for the Sons of the Six.  But the jungle is alive and full of secrets.  And magic.

In my opinion, there were a lot of missed opportunities in Beasts of Prey, especially in the development of the character of Koffi.

Koffi had all the potential in the world to be a bad-ass heroine.   She has lived most of her life as an indentured servant at the Night Zoo caring for wild beasts.  I wanted more of the Night Zoo and her connection to these animals.  And I wanted to see her rely on that knowledge when they encountered wild and bizarre beasts in the jungle.  Instead, Ekon must save her repeatedly.  I have a feeling that power shift will happen in Beasts of Ruin – or at least I’m hoping.

The novel is well-written with an intriguing premise.  I loved the dynamic between the Gedes and the Yabas, particularly in their worship; they have the same gods, but the Gedes rely on the animal familiars to pass messages to the deities because they are not allowed in the Yaba temples.  While there is a romance (or two), it doesn’t cloud or bog down the novel, unlike a lot of other works in this genre.  Overall, it’s a well-done debut.

Read this book.

THE WINNERS – Fredrik Backman

“You run on ahead.”

I fully expected Fredrik Backman to shatter my heart with The Winners (Atria 2022), and the third and final installment of the Beartown trilogy did just that.  But also as expected, it picked the pieces up, held them tenderly, and whispered hope, love, resilience, and strength.

The following is a quote from my review of Beartown:

“I’ve said before that Backman is a “heartbeat author” and that “his books are hugs, eyelash kisses, and belly laughs.” But he’s also a “heartbreak author” and his books, especially Beartown, are tinged with anger, grief, and despair.  His characters and communities are so perfectly imperfect, and his storytelling style, the love and humor and warmth, is what makes a book about a rape in hockey town so fantastic.”

These words are so true of all of Backman’s work, but it’s no more apparent than it is in this 670 page novel. I’ve seen some reviews complaining about the length – don’t listen to them.  This heartbreaking hug of novel is for us, each and every word – because we love the Bears and we love Beartown almost as much as Backman.  Almost.

The novel opens two years after the events of Us Against You.  A massive storm is battering Beartown and Hed. One of Beartown’s heartbeats dies.  Backman doesn’t reveal who until over one hundred pages in, but you know; there’s only one person who would bring both Maya and Benji home. Woven through the story of loss, rebuilding, homecoming and redemption is the story of a young boy whose sister overdosed after she was raped.  He is filled with rage and loneliness and despair.  It very easily could have been Leo and Maya’s story, and Amat very easily could have been Mumble.  It’s the finest of lines that divide us.

I’m not going to spoil this delicious and perfect conclusion, but I will say  I’m going to miss Beartown.  I’m going to miss the most perfect of bad boys, Benji – our hero who was destined to die young. We knew it was coming – Backman told us in Beartown.  But it didn’t hurt any less.  Backman reminds us that sometimes the good guys are bad, sometimes the bad guys are good, and that often we all sit somewhere in the middle.

“We are the Bears!  We are the Bears!  We are the Bears from Beartown.”

Read this book.

HOW THE ONE-ARMED SISTER SWEEPS HER HOUSE – Cherie Jones

I rarely post trigger/content warnings, and I try to avoid reviews with them – that’s my reading preference.  You may prefer them.  And that’s perfectly acceptable.  That said, Cherie Jones’s How the One-Armed Sister Sweeps her House (Little, Brown & Co., 2021) is one TW/CW after the other: infanticide, incest, rape, child molestation, domestic violence, brutal assaults, animal abuse, murder, addiction, police brutality, abortion, torture, etc.  This list really could go on and on.  Some things are mentioned in passing, others as flashes of memory, and some in great detail.  There are multiple instances of rape, abuse, and domestic violence with victims varying from a prostitute to a young girl to a young boy to adults.  The perpetrators also vary – including parents, spouses, police and strangers.  This was the rare read that I nearly DNF’d; I didn’t, but I do wish I’d never started it.  It was simply too much, too hard, too hopeless.  (And the dog dies in this one.)

Despite that, there is no denying Cherie Jones’s talent.  The blurb calls to mind Zadie Smith (early Smith is by far my favorite, and I could see echoes of White Teeth in the work), but I was also reminded of Jamaica Kincaid’s “Girl” – a ready comparison with another Caribbean protagonist.  It’s a gritty and bloody heartbreak of a novel that primarily follows LaLa and her abusive husband after the birth of their daughter, Baby, which occurs immediately following the commission of a crime.  The island is full of characters – from rich, white men and the former prostitutes they married to young men who sell their bodies to the tourists, to the women who plait hair on the beach for US dollars; but the island is also its own living and breathing character, and it’ll chew you up and spit you on the beach with the rest of the trash.

It’s well-written and compelling, but this is a “not for me” novel.

WHEN WOMEN WERE DRAGONS – Kelly Barnhill

“Beatrice and I walked home in the snow, pulling the weight of my mother’s memories behind us.”

“There is a limit to how much we can hold, and how much we can keep in this world. It’s not a good idea to cling to the things you can’t bear to lose. That’s how we break, you see?”

“There are memories that we carry that are not our own.”

“I was four years old when I first saw a dragon.  I was four years old when I first learned to be silent about dragons.  Perhaps this is how we learn silence -an absence of words, an absence of context, a hole in the universe where the truth should be.”

Kelly Barnhill tugged at my heart with her middle grade novel The Girl Who Drank The Moon, but her first adult novel, When Women Were Dragons (Doubleday 2022) was like a hug from a night sky or being kissed by flames – it roars with a fierce love for women, including women by birth and women by choice.  The novel is dedicated to Christine Blasey Ford, whose testimony “triggered this narrative.”

The novel starts with Alex’s first memory of a dragon.  She was four.  This was before the Mass Dragoning of 1955, and at a time when Alex’s mother had disappeared and her aunt Marla was caring for her.  As she grew up, Alex realized her mother was in the hospital battling cancer, but these months without her mother, and her mother’s fragile return, and this dragon are burned in Alex’s memory.

Aunt Marla is far too big for the box society is trying to put her in, yet she gets married and has a child because it’s what is expected of her.  (The greatest love of her life was a woman she flew planes with during the war.  Marla was supposed to dragon with her, but she didn’t – she held on to her skin for her sister.) Marla’s daughter, Beatrice, becomes the thing Alex loves most in the world.  After Marla dragoned during the Mass Dragoning of 1955, Alex’s mother never spoke of her again.  History was rewritten to erase Marla’s existence and to make Alex’s cousin Beatrice her sister.  But Alex never truly forgets.

In one of the more heartbreaking scenes (and there are several), Alex is playing with her only friend, Sonja.  Alex loves Sonja without being able to fully identify that love.  When her father encounters them during a sweetly intimate moment of discovery, he pulls them apart.  To further harden his daughter’s heart, he buys the house Sonja’s family is renting and evicts them. With Sonja gone, it’s just Alex and Beatrice again.  Alex quickly learns that the box society has created for women is not one she’s going to fit in, at least not quietly. She is adamant on the use of her masculine nickname and that she will go to college; her destiny will not mirror her mother’s.

The novel is a bildungsroman wrapped in magical realism and a history that oft forgot the women.  Chapters are broken up with scientific journals, letters, Congressional hearings, etc. related to the “dragoning phenomenon” that no one was allowed to speak of openly, at least not until the women returned and refused to be silenced or ignored.

It’s a novel about mothers and sisters and daughters.  Love and loss. Memories and mistakes.  Standing up and letting go.  Secrets and truth.  And dragons, it’s about dragons.

Read this book.

THE FORTUNES OF JADED WOMEN – Carolyn Huynh

“Because there was nothing wrong with having Vietnamese daughters. It was how the world treated them that turned it into a curse.”

Carolyn Huynh’s The Fortunes of Jaded Women (Atria Books 2022) was a highly anticipated release for me.  Magical realism, historical fiction, Asian diaspora, a matrilineal family saga… I was sold. Now that I’ve finished, I feel a bit like I was duped; it just doesn’t deliver.

I was truly anticipating more Peach Blossom Spring, The Mountains Sing meets The Kitchen God’s Wife.  Instead, it’s giving more of a less decadent Kevin Kwan vibe. Don’t get me wrong – it’s a cute read, but it’s far more candy & cozy than I expected. 

Expectations aside, it would have benefited from less characters and/or significantly more development.  I couldn’t connect with any of the characters because they were presented in bursts of plot lines that jumped forward months.

At the novel’s core, is the curse.  The family was cursed when Oanh Du’o’ng left her husband for another man.  Her ex-mother-in-law sought out a witch to curse the family to only have daughters – no sons or grandsons or great grandsons in the family tree.  Since only men can invite the ancestors into the homes and the curse also included bad luck in love, the curse was intended to keep the women unhappy in both life and death.  Every generation was met with daughters, unhappiness, and bitterness.

But a psychic in Hawaii, a traditional herbalist, and the death of a matriarch might just provide enough magic to break the curse, bring a splintered family together, and call the ancestors home.

I wish there were more character development, particularly in the eight granddaughters.  There is some great stuff there, but it’s barely scratching the surface, and this novel had ample room to grow – it’s not even 300 pages.  It’s cute, but just a bit empty.

MAPS OF OUR SPECTACULAR BODIES – Maddie Mortimer

“That the peace aches more than the misery.”

My ninth read of the 2022 Booker Prize longlist was Maddie Mortimer’s debut novel, Maps of Our Spectacular Bodies (Scribner 2022).  Much like many of the other books on the longlist, Maps is rather a unique story.  Mortimer elects to use font and format to provide an enhanced reading experience, which works well – at least most of the time.

The novel is centered around Lia, who is dying of cancer.  Memories of her life, tortured conversations with her estranged mother and a toxic first love, are written on her body.  But so is the good.  The swell of her stomach when she was pregnant. The moment she fell in love with her husband. Moments with her daughter.  Laughs with Connie.  In flashes, her life unfolds – narrated in part by the cancer that is eating her.

Her memories reside inside her body, and her loved ones try and fight the cancer from within: Raven (her father) and Dove (her mother).  Gardener with daisies in his eyes (her husband), Yellow (her bright daughter), Velvet (her beloved friend) and Fossil (her first love). Red, the boy on his bike, is the chemo treatment that courses through her body.

With Death approaching Lia, her husband finds himself despairingly contemplating life without her, leaning into a possible affair and battling jealousy over that first love that has so marked her life.  Her daughter, Iris, in that fragile time between girl and teen, is struggling the most.  She finds herself caught in a middle grade “mean girls” situation where secrets are currency. Lia’s mother, Anne, is trying desperately to right the wrongs made oh so many years ago.

The Cancer is a malevolent character, thriving on chaos, brokenness, and destruction, who enjoys breaking Lia’s spirit as much as her body.

Like unexpected fireworks in the night, Maps hits with an unexpected BOOM! followed by brilliant colors full of life, and leaving the faint but not unpleasant smell of gunpower and whispers of smoke in the blue-black sky.

Read this book.

Booker Count: 9 of 13.

US AGAINST YOU – Fredrik Backman

“People we love will die.  We will bury our children beneath our most beautiful trees.”

“On the hilltop stand two girls, watching the car disappear.  They’ll soon be sixteen. One of them is holding a guitar, the other a rifle.”

Fredrik Backman is easily one of my top five contemporary authors.  The following is quote from my review of Beartown.

“I’ve said before that Backman is a “heartbeat author” and that “his books are hugs, eyelash kisses, and belly laughs.” But he’s also a “heartbreak author” and his books, especially Beartown, are tinged with anger, grief, and despair.  His characters and communities are so perfectly imperfect, and his storytelling style, the love and humor and warmth, is what makes a book about a rape in hockey town so fantastic.”

Backman takes us back to Beartown in Us Against You (Atria 2018, English translation by Neil Smith. Originally published in Sweden by Bokforlaget Forum 2017), and the town is still reeling from the events that left it in ruins.  Before the town can rise, it must fall even further.  What unfolds is a violent, fiery and bloody story of resilience, family, loyalty and loss:  Beartown Against the Rest.

With Beartown on the cusp of losing its hockey club, a politician gets involved – using the town and their love of the sport as pawns on his chessboard.  The A-team is young and scrappy, but full of heart. They’re also backed by the dangerous but loyal Pack – the very group of “hooligans” whose presence the GM has been instructed to remove from the game. With a female coach, a goalie with a criminal record and an intensity that leans into violence, and a captain whose damaging secret has been revealed to the town – maybe, just maybe, they can beat Hed.

Hearts and noses will break, friendships will be tested, families will falter, and tears will fall.  Beartown didn’t need to be a trilogy, but I’m so glad it is; I’m not ready to be done with this town.  The final installment will be released later this month, and I just hope my heart heals before then so Backman can break it again.

Read this book.