Wow, these stories are emotional and heartbreaking and feel incredibly raw to read. This collection of eight short stories is set between Miami and Port-au-Prince and focuses on intimate moments of human life. Love, loss, and heartbreak. It is not often when I read a collection of short stories and find every single one to have a special spark and to touch me in their own way but this collection did.

There were two stories that I found particularly emotional.

One was Sunrise, Sunset. The story looks at three generations of a family; mother, daughter and grandson. This story struck home on a personal level as it touches on the fragility of the mind and particularly the spiraling decline of those with Alzheimer's. It felt incredibly raw and I felt the emotions strongly having experienced seeing my own family members lost to Alzheimer's.

The second was Without Inspection, the final story in this collection which focuses on themes of immigration and loss. This ended the collection by making me cry.

Overall this is an absolutely beautiful collection of short-stories. I found it difficult to articulate my feelings on this book. One thing I will say it that although this book is heartbreaking I also found it gentle and calming as it enveloped you in a warmth of comfort almost as it told these stories off love, loss and family. I felt some of my own experiences of loss echoed in this book and I felt like this book touched on a lot.

Thanks to the publishers for a review copy in exchange for a honest review.

Here to Stay by Adriana Herrera is a workplace romance centered on Rocco Quinn and Julia del Mar Ortiz. Julia is the programme leader for the clothing brand Strum's charity foundation and Rocco has been brought in to assess the company as the owners are pushing to go public as an IPO. I liked the concept working in finance and being interested in charity work I could vibe with both the roles that Rocco and Julia had. I also really liked Julia's character, her relationship with her family, her focus on her Dominican Republic roots and the Spanish that was scattered throughout the book. This was really warming and enjoyable and it felt homey that she had such a supportive and loving family (as so often in romance novels, the family of the MC are terrible).

However, this book just fell a little flat for me. I thought it could have done with a fair bit of editing down to tidy up some of the dialogue and draw in the relationship a bit more. I liked both Rocco and Julia as characters, although Rocco could be a little bit irritating at times. I just found some of the scenes really unrealistic for an otherwise fairly realistic novel in their relationship. I also felt like the pacing was really slow on this one. I really wanted to like it more, but sadly it just fell a little flat for me.

Thanks to Netgalley for the eARC.

This was my first book by Nicole Dennis-Benn and although I struggled initially to get into the narrative I quickly became absorbed in her beautiful writing style and incredibly nuanced and complex characters. This is a story of family, class, race, and relationships that offers a critical view of the damning effects of tourist industry on the Jamaican people.
⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀
Here Comes the Sun follows the tale of Margot and her much younger sister Thandi and their mother Delores.
⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀
Margot as the older sister has given everything in her life to make a better life for her sister Thandi. She works at the local hotel and is seemingly driven by the need to pay for Thandi's education and eventually achieve a better life for herself. Margot is the main focus of the narrative and one of the most complex characters as we see her internal struggles, her troubled upbringing and the impact this has had on her identity and behaviour. Through Margot, Dennis-Benn also explores ideas of sexuality, examines lesbian relationships, and the homophobia that exists in Jamaica.
⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀
Thandi meanwhile is plagued by the pressures her mum and older sister reap on her to perform at school and go on to become a doctor. She is also conflicted about the dark colour of her skin compared to her upper-class and wealthy classmates. Dennis-Benn uses Thandi's character as a means to to explore ideas of class and colourism, and her storyline made me the most emotional.
⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀
Their mother Delores on the other hand sells crafts and trinkets to tourists and has strong ideals about what she expects from her daughters. Through Delores character we see the harsh realities of Jamaican poverty and the change that has occured over time.
⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀
Not only were the three main women in this story expertly crafted, but Dennis-Benn constructed a rich narrative with intricate stories for all the secondary characters. The speech used reflects the local dialects and inflections and really immersed me in Jamaica. Here Comes the Sun broke my heart a little bit and yet again another novel that will stay with me for some time.

The Soul of a Woman

"We have to love ourselves a lot and love others without calculating how much we are loved in return. This is the stage of kindness."

The Soul of a Woman is part memoir, part discussion of feminism where Allende talks about love, loss, passion and sense of self.

I thought some of the most interesting aspects were when Allende spoke about her age and the way older women are viewed and behaved. She spoke about how she lacks the same concerns she did when she was younger about competing, people pleasing, looking good. How she is less afraid. How we have a generation of older women raised in an era of emerging feminism and women's rights who are passing on this legacy to their children and grandchildren.

Allende is incredibly self-assured and it gave me great comfort to see a woman so comfortable in her older age. Comfortable in her sense of self and awareness. Allende talks about how she is still learning; how her grandchildren have made her think about personal pronouns, how she has witnessed great changes in her time.

I feel like the voices of older women are so often silenced and so this was great to read in that sense.

"Age should not limit our energy or creativity or our willingness to participate in the world."

My problem with the book lay in some of Allende's comments on feminism which felt a little generic and off-hand at times particularly on the subject of the burka and how women wear it purely out of fear of men. This seemed to contrast with her more careful attitudes towards sexuality and gender pronouns and was disappointing to see. And whilst this is part memoir examing Allende's relationship with feminism. I found some of this generalisations did not hit the mark right and some of them were problematic when she spoke about wider feminism. The book as a whole also felt a little disjointed and unplanned which could be because I read an uncorrected proof.

Overall I was little disappointed with this one and whilst I loved Allende's fire and her writing style so will definitely be picking up her novels. I couldn't appreciate all she said.

Thanks to netgalley and Bloomsbury for the uncorrected proof.

THE PROPHETS by Robert Jones Jr

"The past had no use other than to dredge uo pain and mystery and, thus, to confound. And there were already too many things in the present that made no damn sense. So the future was the only possible place where he might find resolution."

The Prophets and emotive story of the love of two queer slaves during antebellum in Southern America. It sweeps across time and draws the reader into a story that has not been told before.

The novel is told from multiple perspectives of the individuals who live on Empty plantation, slave and slave owners. There are also chapters from the African ancestors, the Kosongo people who have much more fluid relations with gender and sexuality. By doing this Robert Jones Jr depicts the inequalities of power, the destructive nature of colonial power and how the god of the white man distorted love between man.

In framing the novel from multiple perspectives Jones Jr also provides considerable nuance and complexity to his characters as we see the torment and considerable conflict in identities across all characters. It also serves to draw out the more sinister side to some of the characters and shows unsettling power dynamics between the genders, between parent and children; in addition to the those power dynamics across race.

The narrative is lyrical, rather slow and meandering in style as the descriptions come in both exquisite and visceral detail which makes it both incredibly pleasant and uncomfortable to read. I found the narrative a little difficult to begin with, but ultimately this novel is a craft and one that rewards the readers who perserve.

The Prophets is unforgettable book and although the love between Isaiah and Samuel shines through it is not without pain. It brought tears to my eyes by the end which was actually unexpected because as much as I thought it was good, I didn't think I'd connected with the characters that much. However, I was proved wrong. The brilliance of this book is the subtle of the relationships and the connection that is created with Isaiah and Samuel who almost certainly have a little piece of my heart. The Prophets demands attention and rightly so.

Thank you to @quercusbooks and @riverrun for the gifted proof.

Okay, wow. That wasn't how I expected this book to end. Full thoughts soon.

It was nice to dip back into this series, it's always a solid read.