You’re Invited

Hardcover book, You’re Invited by Amanda Jayatissa, laying on a pile of envelopes and invitations.

Review #56: Fiction 

You’re Invited by Amanda Jayatissa 

This story’s twists and turns have twists and turns! Though I didn’t love every decision that was made along the way, it’s impossible to call You’re Invited boring or predictable. I had as many theories as there were characters in this book; some panned out, and some Jayatissa took in entirely different directions. In the end, the resolution simply pales in comparison to the tantalizing possibilities we are lured into imagining along the way.  

Amaya and her longtime best friend Kaavi have had a falling out. Amaya has not heard from Kaavi in years and has satiated her curiosities by cyber stalking her across multiple social media sites, all under fabricated accounts. So when an invitation to Kaavi’s wedding arrives (Amaya had no idea Kaavi was seeing someone!) she’s not just intrigued, she’s hopeful. Which is why when she realizes the groom is not just someone she knows, but in fact her ex-boyfriend Spencer, Amaya decides two things: One, she has to go to this wedding. And two, she has to stop it from happening. 

Shortly after Amaya arrives in Sri Lanka for the wedding, she finds out Kaavi didn’t invite her after all, and still wants nothing to do with her. Kaavi allows Amaya to stay and attend to keep up appearances, but there is clearly no love lost between them. Then the night before the wedding, Kaavi goes missing and is presumed dead the longer she goes unfound. Jayatissa utilizes the present and flashbacks to tell Amaya and Kaavi’s story, filling the reader in on what caused their falling out, and all the details from the time Amaya arrived in Sri Lanka up to Kaavi’s disappearance. These present scenes are interwoven with police interviews with the various guests of the wedding after Kaavi is reported missing. 

The interviews as plot progression are one of my favorite things about You’re Invited. They’re a unique way to tell the story and introduce readers to all the various players at the same time. Since these interviews are incredibly self-serving, we develop a mistrust of everyone. They’re all just a little bit unreliable, which makes them all suspects. With the inclusion of the intricate and extravagant depictions of the Sri Lankan culture and elaborate wedding celebrations of the wealthy, You’re Invited feels like the love child of Crazy Rich Asians and an Agatha Christie novel.  

None of the characters is more suspicious than Amaya herself, at times in a way that is far too heavy handed, to the point of being ridiculous and obviously an attempt to steer the reader in her direction. This only made me more sure that Amaya would not be whodunit. Amaya has a highly active, violent imagination and dislikes everyone. She has some online friends, and I questioned if they were even real a few times with how detached from reality Jayatissa portrays Amaya. It would not have been much of a surprise if we ended up with Amaya the obsessed, jilted stalker as kidnapper and possible murderer. 

In the flashbacks, we find out Kaavi’s parents adopted a baby girl right before Amaya and Kaavi stopped speaking. Whispers suggest that the little girl is the love child of Amaya and Kaavi’s father. This rumor adds to the understanding of the rift that tore Amaya and Kaavi apart, and explains the frigid welcome Amaya receives from Kaavi’s mother when she arrives. The truth of who this little girl is is what the entire story hinges on.  

When the loose ends are all tied up, what we’re left with in You’re Invited is a story of strong, powerful women who are ruthless when it comes to keeping up with cultural appearances. There’s a wife’s shame because of her husband, a mother’s pride, and a daughter’s unwillingness to become her mother or allow herself to be treated how the generation of women before her were treated. All of these secrets and lies come spilling out the night before Kaavi and Spencer’s wedding, revealing which leads were real and which were red herrings. The truth is still scandalous, but for me, what could have been was far more entertaining.  

My rating: 3 out of 5 stars 

📚📸: @_amber.reads.a.book_ 

Thistlefoot

Review #55: Fiction

Thistlefoot by GennaRose Nethercott

In Thistlefoot, GennaRose Nethercott brings the Baba Yaga folklore into the modern-day, using a magical realism backdrop to tell a unique story of both blood- and found-family. In a debut novel that doesn’t shy away from the painful and grotesque aspects of life, Nethercott builds a world with Grimm’s fairytale bones, complete with whimsy and magic, and modern accents throughout. 

When the Yaga siblings, Bellatine and Isaac, inherit a house from a long lost relative in Eastern Europe, the house getting up and walking around on a pair of chicken legs is just the beginning of the oddities that lie ahead. When a shadowy figure crosses countries and oceans to claim the house for himself, the siblings must band together to understand and protect not just their present, but their past. An epic fantasy that spans thousands of miles and hundreds of years, Thistlefoot breathes new life into Jewish folklore. 

Bellatine and Isaac have not spoken in years—Bellatine pursuing woodworking and looking to settle into a normal life, and Isaac following the whims and impulses of a street performer and petty thief wherever they take him. When they each get the call that a great-great-grandmother has left them an inheritance, they meet again at a shipyard to open the giant container together. When the shock of a sentient house on chicken legs walking out wears off, they strike a deal. If Bellatine joins Isaac on a cross-country tour to perform their family’s old puppet show, he’ll take the spoils, and she can keep the house. What they don’t know, is that the Longshadow Man wants Thistlefoot for himself to settle a century’s old debt. To save themselves and Thistlefoot from a deadly fate, both Bellatine and Isaac must confront their very worst fears from their past and start using each of their unique abilities for good. 

With a cast of characters from the past and present, told through the perspectives of Bellatine, Isaac, and Thistlefoot (who gives us the backstory to understand the Longshadow Man’s pursuit), Thistlefoot will walk right into your heart and soul like a hot cup of tea next to a roaring fire. Nethercott has created a beautiful, whimsical tale of love, loss, and memory through a fantastic adventure complete with ghosts, betrayal, and vengeance. But the ghosts in this story are not just people, they are places and events, and the horror of experiencing a ghost is not shied away from. Nethercott does not hold back on visceral depictions of pain and suffering; she is unashamed of broaching taboo topics and showing the gritty, violent realities of the world. 

Existing in a world of magical realism that I didn’t question for a single second, Thistlefoot is a captivating story of generational trauma, exploring what being bound by blood really means, what a family really is, and the price we’re willing to pay for love. 

My rating: 5 out of 5 stars 

📚📸: @_amber.reads.a.book_ 

The Last Letter from Your Lover

Review #54: Fiction

The Last Letter From Your Lover by Jojo Moyes

I have no patience. A slow burn is one of my arch nemeses when it comes to reading, especially with romance because I just want them to get together already! I find a lot of times the wait is never worth the pay off. In The Last Letter from Your Lover, the combination of the past (before Jennifer’s accident) and the present (after her accident) really helped the slow burn establish a purpose. Moyes makes each scene matter, and the pacing added to the connection the reader has to Jennifer and her condition, her confusion, and the mystery of her life before she forgot who she was. The slow burn here maybe gave the reader a bit too much time to figure out the twists and turns of the mystery, but the ending lives up to those expectations and makes the journey there worthwhile.

Moyes delivers a pretty standard star-crossed lovers romance, mixing in bad timing, and friends who think they’re helping but are hurting, and misunderstanding after misunderstanding resulting in a car crash (no pun intended) of chaos you can’t look away from. I think we could have done without one or two of the red herrings; there’s a touch of whiplash from being misdirected again and again in quick succession. I found myself frustrated with what characters were saying and doing, keeping the most important things from Jennifer in her attempts to reclaim her missing memories, but it was a frustration that kept me reading because above all, I wanted Jennifer to figure it all out.

The Last Letter from Your Lover is a rich and detailed love story that incredibly overcomes the obstacles of injury and time and the status quo on top of those obstacles uniquely created by those suffering a broken heart.

My rating: 4 out of 5 stars

📚📸: @_amber.reads.a.book_

It Ends With Us

Review #50: Fiction

It Ends With Us by Colleen Hoover

*This review contains spoilers*

I was working as a bookseller when the paperback of It Ends With Us was released, and I watched as it flew off the shelves and answered calls asking if we had any in stock and set numerous copies on hold for customers to pick up. It created a ton of buzz for several months in the online book community, and with the announcement of a film adaptation, it’s once again been all the rage. I’m wondering if all the attention surrounding It Ends With Us led to heightened expectations that the book just didn’t end up delivering.

It Ends With Us is a heartbreaking story chronicling generational trauma and intimate relationship violence. Lily, who grew up witnessing her father abuse her mother, finds herself in a relationship with Ryle, a man who is perfect on paper but has a jealous streak and a violent temper. Lily swears she would never have a relationship like her mother and father had, and does end up distancing herself from Ryle, ready to leave him, when she finds out she’s pregnant.

As Lily navigates her pregnancy without much assistance from Ryle, she questions whether the right thing to do is leave him or give him another chance to prove he’s not like her father. In the end, though Ryle has hit her, pushed her down her apartment stairs, and attempted to rape her, Lily nearly chooses to stay. The thing that changes her mind is when she gives birth to her own daughter. Knowing that she watched her father abuse her mother all her life, and how much she despised her father even after his death, Lily chooses not to go back to Ryle, not for herself or her own safety, but for her daughter, so she wouldn’t hate her father the way Lily hated her own.

I didn’t dislike this story; I just didn’t love it. I understand it’s semi-autobiographical, which I appreciate and commend Hoover on being so open and honest and vulnerable with her readers, but with material that’s so close to home, it can be hard to deviate from “what actually happened” even for the sake of the story.

Things that worked well were the character development; most characters were fully dimensional and there was a lot of growth from the start of the book to the end for many of them; and the story itself is strong and powerful. Lily is extremely relatable; I found my own thoughts and hers were nearly identical many times. Hoover uses Lily and her experiences to shine a light on so many similar real-life stories and gives those who may have experienced the same things a voice. She also pulls the curtain back for those of us who haven’t had these experiences, showing just how complicated these situations really are. Where it loses me is in the details.

Throughout there seems to be a thread of rationalizing or excusing abusive behavior. Ryle behaves disgustingly, but because of an incident when he was a child, his blind rages and violence are made to be seen as, if not acceptable, at least understandable. It was awful reading the passages where Ryle, Ryle’s sister (and Lily’s best friend) Allysa, and even Lily herself use Ryle’s past to explain away his behavior.

In the end, Lily chooses not to stay with Ryle, but not because she has chosen her own happiness and safety; Lily leaves so her daughter can love her father. It’s an ending that is both beautiful and excruciatingly frustrating. On the one hand, good for Lily choosing to end the cycle of trauma and abuse before her daughter gets pulled into it. On the other hand, I really wanted to see Lily choose herself. Had she not been pregnant, had it not been a girl, would she have stayed? I’d like to think not, but since she only made the choice after seeing her daughter and wanting a different experience for her, we’ll never know. It Ends With Us is a brave and bold step in the right direction for female empowerment in fiction, it just didn’t go far enough.

My rating: 3 out of 5 stars.

📚📷: @_amber.reads.a.book_