Thought provoking but I didn't love it
This story is about Cassie's quest to find out some more information about her birth mother. Her adoptive parents are not so keen for her to do so and their determination in this mean that cracks start to appear in their familial relationships.
I'm finding it quite hard to review this book. I liked the story and the writing but I didn't like many of the characters which I found difficult in a highly character and relationship focused novel. Many of the decisions and actions taken by Cassie's adoptive parents and even Cassie herself, were frustrating and although I appreciate that this makes the reader think about the difficulties with adoption, it was a little too frustrating for me and hindered my connection with the characters. I unfortunately felt the same about a couple of the characters brought in a little later in the story - I won't mention who so as to not give anything away - but a couple of the later events involving them were particularly traumatic and I'm not sure whether the events were entirely necessary for the story-line.
Nonetheless Bond did a good job at making the reader really think about the realities of adoption, and I think that maybe some of the events in the story had to be so extreme and the characters' decisions so frustrating in order to make you think so deeply about it. I appreciated how Bond tried to make you consider adoption from the various points of view of everyone involved in such a process, and at the different stages of the process. It's a difficult subject to approach and I think she did a good job, despite my aforementioned reservations. I would give this 3.5 stars but have rounded up to 4 as I recognise that finding the characters in this story frustrating is not necessarily a fault of the story given the difficult context and the importance of getting the reader thinking.
Thanks to Readers First for a free copy of this book in exchange for an honest review.
I'm finding it quite hard to review this book. I liked the story and the writing but I didn't like many of the characters which I found difficult in a highly character and relationship focused novel. Many of the decisions and actions taken by Cassie's adoptive parents and even Cassie herself, were frustrating and although I appreciate that this makes the reader think about the difficulties with adoption, it was a little too frustrating for me and hindered my connection with the characters. I unfortunately felt the same about a couple of the characters brought in a little later in the story - I won't mention who so as to not give anything away - but a couple of the later events involving them were particularly traumatic and I'm not sure whether the events were entirely necessary for the story-line.
Nonetheless Bond did a good job at making the reader really think about the realities of adoption, and I think that maybe some of the events in the story had to be so extreme and the characters' decisions so frustrating in order to make you think so deeply about it. I appreciated how Bond tried to make you consider adoption from the various points of view of everyone involved in such a process, and at the different stages of the process. It's a difficult subject to approach and I think she did a good job, despite my aforementioned reservations. I would give this 3.5 stars but have rounded up to 4 as I recognise that finding the characters in this story frustrating is not necessarily a fault of the story given the difficult context and the importance of getting the reader thinking.
Thanks to Readers First for a free copy of this book in exchange for an honest review.