First a big thank you to Netgalley and the publisher for allowing me to read a free Advanced Copy of this book in exchange for an honest review. I’d also like to thank them for the opportunity to participate in this blog tour.

From the first page, it’s clear that nothing is perfect in the Torres family. We meet the sisters as they are attempting to sneak away from their father and leave home, their destinations unknown. Each girl manages to make it out of the house and they even make it to the train station, but unfortunately they don’t get away. Thanks to meddling neighbor boys and their mother, their father Rafe catches them and forces them back home. We don’t actually know why they are trying to leave, all we know is that they’re unhappy. We learn from the neighbor boys that two months after their failed escape, Ana falls to her death from her bedroom window.

The story picks up a year after Ana’s death, her sister and father still stuck in their grief. Jessica is stuck taking care of their father while working a dead end job and dealing with an abusive boyfriend; Iridian hates her father and allows Ana’s old romance books and her own words to swallow her up; and Rosa believes she has what it takes to help the lost spirit of animals, including a local hyena that happens to be on the loose. In the midst of all of this, strange happenings are occurring in their home leaving them, and the neighbor boys, to believe that Ana’s ghost is haunting them all. Rafe, their father, can’t seem to bring himself out of the rut he is in. He’s constantly grieving or drunk, owes money to the wrong people, and it’s clear that his daughters can’t depend on him. Honestly, he’s been in a perpetual state of grief since their mother died years ago and things have only gotten worse.

I won’t give away plot details other than what’s above, but essentially Tigers, Not Daughters tells the story of what happens to a family lost in grief and attempting to navigate their way out of it. This story is very character driven, each character getting their own POVs and chapters, including the nosey neighbor boys. Each character is distinctive, which I really enjoyed. None of the sisters seemed to run together, which I think can happen sometimes with an ensemble cast like this one. The inclusion of the nosey neighbors and their fascination with the girls actually reminded me of The Virgin Suicides. I’ve also seen a lot of people draw comparisons to King Lear and Little Women as well.

I will say that this was some very heavy content in these pages. How can it not be when we’re watching each character grieve in their own way. If you aren’t sure if you can handle that sort of subject matter, then be cautious when starting this journey. I’ll admit it was a bit intense while I was reading it. There’s also a constant switching of the POV. I didn’t mind it so much, but I know that it’s not something that everyone enjoys. While this story may not necessarily be for everyone, I do think it has a lot to offer. This may not be the ghost story that you’re expecting, but itself definitely an interesting story about family, loss, and grief.