leekaufman's Reviews (426)

This book made me SUPER uncomfortable. It is definitely a page-turner, but no depth or development to the characters, just trauma porn: one bloody, terrible thing after another for 400 pages. The writing itself was pretty innocuous, but the tone is off; it felt like I was being shown Mexico through the eyes of a horrified tourist, not those of a woman born and raised there, and certainly not those of child. Probably because it was written by a white woman with no ties to the Mexican community. While I don't think that authors must only ever write about their personal experience, it still feels exploitive to me that this author is making millions off a book about the violence of Mexico (because really, it is only about violence), when actual living Mexican authors can't get representation by major publishers. Glad I got this one from the library instead of purchasing it.

Beautiful prose, sparse dialogue, jarring jumps in the timeline, SO MANY MOTIFS.

My only wish for this book is that more of it were from Antoinette's perspective. While it is interesting to see the island and the family from her husband's perspective, if it is claiming to be a book that gives a silenced woman a voice... I'd rather have more of her voice.