Review: An Infinite Love Story (by Chanel Cleeton)

My Rating: 4.5 stars

I’ve read nearly all of Chanel Cleeton’s historical fiction novels, her newest release, An Infinite Love Story, is probably my favorite of her works outside of the Perez family series.  This time around, Cleeton centers the story around the Space Race of the 1960s, when the United Staes and Russia were locked in a fierce battle to develop their space program and send people to the moon.  The story opens in 1968 and revolves around Vivian Mitchell, whose astronaut husband Joe has just been launched into space for a lunar orbit mission when his spacecraft loses contact with mission control.  As the days turn into weeks, Joe and his crew are presumed dead.  In the throes of immense grief, Vivian yearns to escape the public scrutiny that comes with the territory of being an astronaut’s wife and instead, mourn her husband in peace – but when the investigation into the lost spacecraft veers off course and the entire incident is in danger of being written off as an “operator error,” Vivian knows she cannot stand idly by and watch people tarnish the reputation of the dear husband who dedicated his life to advancing America’s space ambitions. In so doing, Vivian also shines a light on the struggles that astronaut families face, as well as the sacrifices that the wives especially are expected to make in order to support their husbands’ careers.  When Vivian starts to receive messages of a personal nature that she believes could only have been sent by Joe, her hope in her husband’s survival is rekindled and sets her on the path to not only uncover the mystery of what possibly happened, but most importantly, to bring her husband back to her.

Cleeton’s latest novel is a bit of a departure from her previous works.  In addition to the historical backdrop and the love story that are the usual focal points in all her stories, this one also incorporates some speculative elements, veering slightly into science fiction territory, but in a way that doesn’t detract from the main storyline – specifically, Vivian and Joe’s “infinite love story,” which we get glimpses of through chapters that alternate between the start of their relationship in 1961 and the launch as well as its aftermath in 1968.  I normally don’t read much speculative or science fiction, as the supernatural and science elements usually overwhelm and go over my head, but in this case, Cleeton was able to balance the various genre elements – historical, romance, science fiction – quite perfectly. 

I was also very much invested in the central love story, as Vivian and Joe’s relationship felt believable to me and was written in a way that it was nearly impossible not to want to root for them. All of the supporting characters in the story were also wonderfully rendered – I especially loved the friendship that Vivian and Polly shared, which moved me almost as much as the main romance did. Speaking of which, I felt that Cleeton did a great job with conveying the poignancy of Vivian and Joe’s enduring love for each other, but not in a sappy or saccharine way – their relationship, as well as all the others in the story, were emotionally nuanced and realistic.  Having read most of Cleeton’s previous works, I feel that this one has an emotional depth to it that many of the others lacked.

I definitely enjoyed this one a lot overall, though it fell a tad bit short of 5 stars for me only because I found some of the writing a little clunky and there were some overly repeated phrases (such as “if she was being honest” or some variation of this) that I felt were unnecessary, which distracted me at times as I was reading (though much of this could be attributed to the fact that I read an ARC copy – maybe the final edit will be different). Though with all that said, both issues are relatively minor in the grand scheme of things.  Without a doubt, I definitely recommend picking this one up, especially if you’re a fan of Cleeton’s works.  For me personally, I feel that Cleeton gets better and better with each novel, which makes me anticipate what she might write next!

Received ARC from Berkley via NetGalley.

Review: The Young Will Remember (by Eve J. Chung)

My Rating: 4.5 stars

Ever since I finished reading Taiwanese American author Eve J. Chung’s stunning and immersive debut novel Daughters of Shandong back in 2023, I have been eagerly anticipating her next book, so I of course was ecstatic to find out that her sophomore novel, The Young Will Remember, would be published this year.  Whereas Chung’s debut drew on her own family history – specifically, the story of her maternal grandmother and her experiences during the Chinese civil war -- this second novel is inspired by her half-Korean husband’s family history and shed lights on another lesser-known piece of 20^th century history:  the Korean War, which was also known as the “Forgotten War.” At the same time, Chung also incorporates her own experiences as a women’s human rights lawyer as well as her work with victims of sexual violence to bring some much-needed attention to the crime of military sexual slavery and the history of “comfort women” during World War II and the wars that followed it. 

Chung weaves these threads together through the story of Eleanor (Ellie) Chang, a Chinese American journalist who becomes trapped behind enemy lines when the plane she is riding in goes down in the mountains of North Korea at the height of the Korean War.  Upon witnessing her comrades being executed in cold blood, Ellie believes she is about to meet the same fate – that is, until a woman she later comes to know as “Emma” claims Ellie as her long-lost daughter Song Yun-Hee, whom Emma had been searching for ever since she was kidnapped by Japanese occupation forces during the previous war.  Even though Ellie is obviously not her daughter, Emma takes her into the home where she lives with her long-time friends, the Pak family – Pastor Pak, his wife Imo, and their son Jae-Min – and treats her as part of the family.  Gradually, Ellie forges a close connection with Emma and Imo – a relationship that only grows stronger as the war intensifies and they are eventually forced to escape to safety in the south. Throughout their harrowing escape, even as they bear witness to the chaos and destruction of bombs raining down on them almost daily, Emma never stops searching for her daughter and at some point, Ellie also takes up the search for Yun-Hee as her own personal mission.  While the search for Yun-Hee is a thread woven throughout the narrative, the heart and soul of the story centers around the bond that Ellie and Emma form as they endure the difficulties of life amidst the upheaval of war.

Once again, Chung delivers a moving story about ordinary women who, bound together by the will to survive the extraordinary hardship and devastating heartbreak that they face, fight against all odds to rise resiliently above the forces that threaten them.  In situating her characters within the historical context of the impact that World War II had on Korea (which she discusses in her Author’s Note), Chung succeeds in doing what well-researched and well-written historical fiction does best: shed much-needed light on little known aspects of history that can also serve as relevant teaching moments when circumstances require it.  In this light, and given its themes, the title of the novel – The Young Will Remember – is indeed apt.

While I still prefer Chung’s debut novel Daughters of Shandong (which was a 5-star read for me), this sophomore effort is a worthwhile read and definitely highly recommended – though with the caveat that this won’t be an easy read by any means, given its depiction of war and its atrocities. Even so, it is still time well-spent.

Received ARC from Berkley via NetGalley.

Review: Boring Asian Female (by Canwen Xu)

My Rating: 2.5 stars

I have serious mixed feelings after reading this book. At first, I thought this would be a book right up my alley, with its Chinese American protagonist and spot-on (in the first few chapters at least) depiction of the struggles with identity and belonging that children from immigrant families encounter. Indeed, I found the opening chapters especially resonant, as the protagonist, Elizabeth Zhang, talks about her singular obsession of getting into Harvard Law School and why this is so important to her – a perspective shaped by her experiences growing up amongst two disparate and constantly clashing cultures.  For the first four chapters, I was able to relate to Elizabeth’s struggles and actually felt that we had some things in common, which led me to empathize with her when she finds out about her rejection from the school of her dreams. But then, starting at the end of chapter five, the story starts to spiral downward into extreme dark academia territory and Elizabeth, instead of being a protagonist I could root for, instead becomes a character that I absolutely could not stand.  Actually, to be blunt, I hated Elizabeth with a passion – not only because of her extreme, over-the-top, verging on batsxxt crazy behavior and actions, but mostly because of her constant efforts to justify and rationalize her every horrible thought / action / behavior. 

There are two types of tropes in stories that absolutely frustrate me (and I try to avoid reading as much as possible):  one is “rich people behaving badly (and feeling entitled to it)” and the other is “delusional people acting stupidly (and constantly trying to justify it).”  The protagonist in this story was the perfect manifestation of the second category, which put her in “annoying as hell” territory for me – though to be honest, to say that I could not stand Elizabeth is actually putting it mildly. Starting from chapter 5 on, the entire time I was reading, the main thought running through my mind was that, at the end of this story, Elizabeth better get comeuppance for her bad behavior – in fact, finding out what the consequences would be for her was the only reason why I resisted the urge to DNF this book early on and instead, pushed myself to read through to the end (though yes, I did skim some parts, though mostly because I was starting to get a headache from reading sentence after sentence about Elizabeth’s horrid behavior and warped justifications, to the point that I honestly wanted to jump out the window).  Whether she gets comeuppance or not, of course I’m not going to mention, but I will say this – I hated the ending so much that I lowered my rating by one full star because of it.

With all that said, I am definitely an outlier with this book, as majority of the reviews I’ve seen so far have been fairly positive.  In this light, maybe this is one of those situations where I’m just not the right reader for this book in the sense that I’m probably taking the story too seriously rather than appreciating what the author was likely trying to do (satirical takedown of academia and the Ivy League admissions process, perhaps?).  Speaking of “takedown,” this book actually reminded me of another book written by a Chinese American female author that was also “satirical takedown” but of the publishing industry: R.F. Kuang’s Yellowface, which also featured a much-loathed (and, yes, delusional) protagonist engaging in the most god-awful behavior and justifying it up the wazoo (though by all accounts, that book was much better written, in my humble opinion). 

Given that I had such an unpleasant reading experience with this one, I am going to refrain from giving an opinion in terms of whether to recommend this or not, since each reader’s taste will be different.  I’m personally not a fan of dark academia, which probably played a role in why I couldn’t really stomach this one, but that doesn’t mean others won’t enjoy it.  So I would say before deciding whether to pick this one up, read other reviews to get a more well-rounded picture first.

Received ARC from Berkley via NetGalley.

Review: The Lost Story of Eva Fuentes (by Chanel Cleeton)

My Rating: 4 stars 

As much as I wish for it to be otherwise, my reading life is off to a late start this year.  I wasn’t able to read much in January or February due to some things I had to take care of in my personal life, so now, heading into March, I’m trying to play catch up with my TBR.  Though I guess if I’m being honest, it’s not that I didn’t do any reading the past 2 months (because I’m always reading something), but rather I didn’t want to spend time writing about it.  In any case, now that I have things a little bit more under control, I’m starting to slowly but surely clear out my ARC list.

 

It's actually a little bit ironic that the first ARC I’m starting with this year doesn’t publish until July, but that’s how things ended up turning out.  The Lost Story of Eva Fuentes is Chanel Cleeton’s latest Cuban-themed historical fiction novel and it’s definitely a good one!  I’ve read most (but not all) of Cleeton’s past novels and especially enjoyed her series about the Perez family, though her other novels (the ones not about the Perez family) have been a hit or miss for me overall.  With this latest one, I’m guessing I enjoyed it so much because the storyline revolves around a lost book and its connection to three women from three different time periods. 

In the present timeline (London in 2024), Margo Reynolds is hired to help her client find a rare book that was written 120 years ago, but there is a huge catch – only one copy of the book is currently in existence.  Though Margo accepts the challenge, she quickly realizes that she may actually be in over her head as other parties interested in the book start to come out of the woodwork and her life is placed in danger.  The timeline then moves to Havana in 1966, where librarian Pilar Castillo lives in grief and anger over the loss of her husband, who was arrested and imprisoned for going against Fidel Castro’s regime.  Pilar comes into possession of the mysterious book when it is turned over to her for safekeeping by a neighbor and eventually becomes more than a source of comfort for her as she endures the difficulties of living under Castro’s repressive regime.  Finally, the third timeline, in 1900, introduces us to the author of the book, Eva Fuentes, a Cuban teacher who is given the opportunity to travel to the United States as part of a summer cultural exchange program at Harvard University. During Eva’s stay there, she experiences both joy and heartbreak that not only end up altering the course of her life, but also provide the inspiration for her novel.

 

I have to admit that I was a bit dubious at first how the story would unfold given how far apart the three timelines were.  It turns out I didn’t have to worry though, as Cleeton definitely knew what she was doing in making Eva’s book the central thread that connected the seemingly disparate timelines together, but in a way that was seamless and made sense for the story’s development.  Given my affinity for historical fiction, no doubt that I enjoyed Eva’s and Pilar’s timelines more -- Margo’s timeline was well done overall, but since the three timelines alternated with each chapter, it did feel a little jarring to jump from an early 20^th century historical setting to a modern day murder mystery setting in 2024.  Things turned out fine in the end though.

 

As an avid reader and also a writer myself, I love learning about the behind-the-scenes aspects of how a particular story came to be as well as the inspirations for certain characters and events, which is perhaps why Cleeton’s latest work resonated with me more than her previous novels did.  Speaking of behind-the-scenes, Cleeton writes in her Author’s Note that The Lost Story of Eva Fuentes is a “love letter to the power of books and the impact they leave on our lives,” which is one of the main reasons why she had Eva’s fictional book be what links the three women in the three different timelines together.  I couldn’t agree more!  Cleeton fans will definitely want to pick this one up, but those who enjoy “books about books” will likely enjoy this one as well.

 

Received ARC from Berkley via Book Browse First Impressions program.

Review: The House on Biscayne Bay (by Chanel Cleeton)

My Rating:  3.5 stars

In her latest work, Chanel Cleeton tackles the gothic theme by centering her dual timeline story around Marbrisa, a glamorous mansion built in Miami, Florida right after the Great War. The over-the-top mansion is a gift that Robert Barnes surprises his wife with for her birthday, but during the inaugural party to celebrate the estate's completion, tragedy strikes and their lives are changed forever.  More than 20 years later, Carmen Acosta has no place to go after the tragic death of her parents in an accident, so she moves into the Marbrisa, the mansion that is currently home to her sister Carolina and her rich husband Asher Wyatt.  Prior to her arrival though, strange things were already happening at the mansion but things escalate soon after, to the point where Carmen's life is in danger.  Is Marbrisa cursed and haunted like people believe it is?  Or are the strange events the result of something more sinister?  

Overall, Cleeton's latest foray into Gothic fiction was entertaining, but I enjoyed her previous works more.  While the writing was good (as expected), the plot was way too predictable, to the point that I already had everything figured out less than halfway through the story, which of course took the "suspense" out of things (not to mention some loose ends never got explained, which created a few plot holes here and there).  The other issue I had was the narrative structure: the story was told in a dual timeline structure, with each time timeline narrated from the first person perspective of its respective protagonist— Anna in 1918 and Carmen in 1941.  The two protagonists couldn't have been more different in terms of age, race, life experiences, circumstances, etc., yet at times, I found it difficult to tell the two narrative voices apart and had to go back to check the chapter heading to remind myself which timeline I was reading.  This got a bit tiring after awhile, though it wasn't to the extent where it prevented me from moving through the story at a decent pace.

As I mentioned earlier, I did enjoy this one, but I have to admit that I was a little bummed that the story this time around had no connection to the Perez family (though I shouldn't have been surprised, since this book and her Cleeton's previous one were both standalone). With that said, there was an indirect link to one of Cleeton's previous novels — a "blink and you'll miss it" reference that I totally missed and only found out about after reading the Author's Note.

Even though I didn't take to this one as much as I thought I would, Cleeton continues to be one of those "go-to" authors for me whose works I will continue to read regardless (though I do hope she writes another book with a Perez family connection at some point).

Received ARC from Berkeley via NetGalley.

Review: Daughters of Shandong (by Eve J. Chung)

My Rating:  5 stars

This incredible debut by Taiwanese-American lawyer Eve J. Chung doesn't come out until May 2024, but I was able to get an advance copy and boy am I glad I did.  Inspired by her family's history, Chung weaves the fictional story of Li-Hai, the eldest of four daughters from the Ang family, wealthy landowners in the small rural town of Zhucheng in Shandong, China. The year is 1948 and even though World War II has officially ended, China is caught up in its own civil war between the current ruling party, the Nationalists under Chiang Kai-shek and the Communists led by Mao Zedong.  In a country still steeped in the Confucian ideal of "zhong nan qing nu" ("value men, belittle women"), Hai's mother Chiang-Yue is treated worse than a servant in the Ang household due to her inability to produce a male heir (to say that Yue is "mistreated" is an understatement —  in addition to suffering constant physical and verbal abuse at the hands of her mother-in-law, her husband also neglects her and never speaks up for her).  In the eyes of the Ang elders, Hai and her sisters, being daughters, are considered "disappointments" and "useless mouths to feed" (their grandmother Nai Nai has no qualms about telling them to their faces that they are better off dead  so the family doesn't have to waste money on them anymore) — which is why, when the Communist army invades the town and the family is forced to flee, they decide to leave mother and daughters behind.  Abandoned and left to fend for themselves, Yue and her daughters become destitute and penniless after the Communists seize their home and kick them out.  Worse yet, in the absence of any Ang family males, Hai, as the eldest daughter at 13 years old, is chosen to answer for her father's and grandfather's "crimes" and is subsequently tortured to near death.  With the help of former workers whom Yue had always treated kindly, mother and daughters escape to the city of Qingdao, where they hoped to reunited with the rest of the family. They survive the arduous journey to Qingdao, only to find out that the family actually relocated to Taiwan (where Chiang Kai-shek re-established the Nationalist base after fleeing China).  Abandoned once again, the Ang women figure out a way to overcome the many obstacles they face, including  enduring a thousand mile journey to Hong Kong and eventually finding their family in Taiwan.  

The story is narrated in the first person from Hai's perspective, which was the perfect narrative structure in this case because it made the experience more immersive and personal.  In her Author's Note (which is not to be missed), Chung explains the inspiration for the story, which was originally going to be a biography of sorts about her maternal grandmother, whom she had stayed with in Taiwan as a child.  But after her grandmother died, she realized there were too many gaps in her grandmother's life that she knew nothing about and regrettably had never asked, so she pivoted to turning the family history she was planning to write into a fictional story using the notes and interviews that she and her mother had already gathered.  Basing the character of Hai on her maternal grandmother, Chung was able to fill in the gaps of her own family history, but more than that, for us readers, she delivered a beautifully-written story about a family of women who survive devastating heartbreak and hardship to resiliently rise above the entrenched cultural norms that bind them to inferiority within their society. 

As a Chinese daughter myself, I resonated deeply with Hai and many of the struggles she went through in trying to reconcile her identity with her culture.  While I didn't share all of the experiences she went through, I did grow up under the same Chinese culture, so I was familiar with many of the antiquated traditions as well as the historical context in the story. Even with this familiarity, I have to admit that many of the scenes involving Hai's POS (pardon my French) father and grandmother and their horrible treatment of the mothers and daughters in the family were hard to read. With that said though, this is actually where Chung's story stands out from many of the other historical novels that revolve around Chinese culture and tradition — I appreciated the way that she succinctly and clearly lays out the facts of how women were treated during that time without mincing words.  More than any other novel I've read in recent years (specifically ones written in contemporary times), this one does a great job exploring the internal battle that many of the women who grow up in these restrictive cultures face — despite understanding the injustices they suffer, they've internalized what they've been taught to the extent that it not only becomes a "normal" part of who they are, they also oftentimes end up perpetuating these same injustices (whether intentionally or unintentionally) onto future generations. To this point, there were many thought-provoking quotes throughout the book (which I of course marked up), but the following excerpt stood out to me the most.  In this scene, Hai (as an adult now) gets into an argument with her mother, who finally, after many years, gives birth to a son, Ming, to carry on the Ang family name (though ironically, this doesn't alleviate the poor treatment that the mother continues to endure because the mother-in-law is already used to abusing her); Hai sees her mother giving her baby brother Ming a bottle of milk while she only gives her other daughter Hua (who was born right before Ming) a bottle of rice water — Hai is livid that her mother would continue to perpetuate the "preferential treatment of boys over girls" tradition after everything they suffered the past couple years precisely because they weren't sons:  "…Mom began to weep. "Hai, Ming is the only one who will support us when we are old. The only one who can care for us in the afterlife. I love Hua and all my other daughters, but I have a duty, as a wife, to make sure Ming grows up well. When you have your own son, you will understand." She cried because she thought I was judging her unfairly, without realizing that her words had cut me deep. Mom hadn't said it explicitly, but I heard it loud and clear: All of us girls were worth less than Ming. She loved us less than Ming. Yet Mom was confused by my anger, and oblivious to my pain. To her, the ancient traditions centering the son were our pillar, entwined in our religion, inseparable from our existence on this earth. Telling her I was hurt would be like saying I was offended by the typhoon that tore through Mount Davis. In her mind, these injustices were part of being a woman, and bearing them was simply our fate. Men made the rules in our society, but women often enforced them. Was there something about having a son that transformed us? Was that why Nai Nai was so wretched? Was that going to be me as a mother? I didn't want it to be. After what I had been through, how could I fall into that same pattern?" Arriving at this understanding becomes tremendously important for the characters in the story, which I won't get into here (you will need to read this one to find out more).

Needless to say, this is a book I highly recommend, but with the understanding that it definitely won't be an easy read.  As with most stories about the travesties of war, this one has brutal scenes as it follows the harrowing journey of the Ang women through several generations, but the payoff at the end is well worth the read.  This story (and its characters) is not one that I will forget anytime soon!

Received ARC from Berkley / Penguin Random House via BookBrowse First Impressions program.

The Cuban Heiress (by Chanel Cleeton)

My Rating: 4 stars

After finishing a book last week that left a bad taste in my mouth, I needed a palette cleanser, a book that I knew I would likely enjoy.  Glancing through my options (amongst the list of April "upcoming" reads I hope to get to), I saw Chanel Cleeton's latest historical novel The Cuban Heiress and I knew that would be the perfect choice.  I've read 5 of Cleeton's books so far and while I enjoyed some of them more than others, I've never been disappointed in her ability to deliver the goods (a solid, satisfying read with compelling characters that are easy to root for). 

 

It's actually hard to talk about this story without giving some aspect of the plot away, so this review will be short, brief, and yes, a bit on the vague side (if the little that is mentioned piques your interest, then I definitely recommend picking this one up and reading it for yourself!).  

 

The story is based on a true event – the disaster that occurred aboard the luxury cruise ship Morro Castle during its voyage from Havana to New York back in 1934. Narrated from the alternating perspectives of the two female protagonists, Elena Palacio and Catherine Dohan, the story unfolded in a way that I felt was a little bit of a departure from Cleeton's last couple books -- whereas the focus with those were more on the historical aspects, this time around, the story seemed to lean more into the mystery / suspense vibe (which I'm totally fine with, since it was done well in this case) as well as the romantic relationships (which thankfully didn't overwhelm the story, so I'm fine with that as well).   Though I will admit that I was hoping there would be more emphasis on the historical aspect, especially about Cuba, since that was one of the areas I enjoyed most with Cleeton's previous novels.  While Cleeton does continue to pay tribute to her Cuban heritage in this story, there isn't as much focus on it in the sense that Cuban history doesn't play as heavily into the plot or the characters' lives compared to her previous works (aside from the fact that one of the characters, Elena, is Cuban, and one leg of the cruise ship's journey is to Havana, the primary events that drive the plot in this story actually have nothing to do with Cuba at all).   Not that I'm complaining though, since the story overall was well-written, intriguing, and engaging to the point that it held my interest and I found it hard to put down after I started reading it -- the way that the 2 characters' backstories were presented not only got me invested in how things would pan out for them, but also had me wondering throughout the entire time whether their stories would converge and if so, how?

 

One thing I did miss with this book is the lack of connection back to the Perez family.  Since Cleeton switched to writing historical fiction in 2018 with Next Year in Havana, which was the first book to feature the Perez family, she has included some kind of connection back to the family in each of her subsequent works (the stand alone ones that weren't direct sequels to the original).  For me, this was part of the fun with reading Cleeton's books — identifying that connection and also getting that sense of satisfaction from having remembered the particular character or relation or plot point back to the original story.  

All in all, this was another enjoyable read from an author whose works I know I can count on to get me out of a reading rut or, in this case, erase the disappointment of a previous less-than satisfying read.  I definitely look forward to reading whatever Cleeton has in store for us next!

Received ARC from Berkeley via NetGalley.

Review: The Minuscule Mansion of Myra Malone (by Audrey Burges)

My Rating: 4 stars

Happy New Year to all!

For my first read of the new year, I decided to start with an ARC of a book that normally wouldn't be up my alley in terms of genre, but the premise of the story interested me enough that I wanted to give it a try.  I'm honestly glad I did because I ended up enjoying this one way more than I thought I would.   

"Once upon a time, there was a house."  Such an appropriate first sentence  for a story that has both a fairy tale feel and a mysterious house as a central character.  Myra Malone came into possession of the Minuscule Mansion (essentially an antique miniature dollhouse but with no dolls) when she was six years old and since then, she became its meticulous and thoughtful "caretaker", dedicating her life to the Mansion's maintenance and upkeep such as mending broken furniture, decorating rooms with themes during holidays, etc.  Now 34 years old, Myra has been living a reclusive life in her family's cabin in Arizona ever since surviving a car accident when she was a child and spends most of her time in the attic tending to the Mansion as well as writing about her experience. Through the encouragement of her only friend (and former neighbor) Gwen, Myra begins to share her writing via blog posts and soon amasses a huge following that numbers in the hundred thousands. Meanwhile, in Virginia, Alex Rakes, who works for his family's custom furniture business, encounters a couple looking to recreate one of the Mansion rooms — when they show him pictures of the room from Myra's website, he is shocked to discover his own bedroom mirrored back to him in miniature scale.  Hoping to find out what is going on, Alex starts up correspondence with Myra and as they begin to share their respective stories as well as slowly unravel the mystery behind the Mansion, they end up going down a path that neither of them expected.

I found this story enchanting and delightful. Even though there are tragic and sad things that occur, these are handled in a thoughtful manner that doesn't diminish the seriousness of the events, while at the same time, maintaining a lightheartedness to the story that made this a compelling but by no means heavy read.  I loved the bits of humor sprinkled throughout the story, especially in the excerpts from Myra's blog posts as well as in the dialogue between the characters.  Speaking of the characters…yes, the main narrative revolves around how Myra and Alex ultimately fall in love, but this was so much more than just a love story — this was also a story about friendship and family, about hope and resilience and overcoming tragedy, about loneliness and finding a sense of connection — most centrally though was the theme of remembrance and how we carry the memories of people and places with us, even when the physical manifestation of them are gone.  

This is one of those books that doesn't fit nicely into a particular genre — some may consider this a fantasy, others may categorize it as contemporary fiction with magical realism elements (I lean toward the latter).  Whatever the category though, I appreciated the uniqueness and charm of the story, which was evident in the fact that, even though some scenes were a bit too "cutesy" for my tastes and the "mystery" part was obvious from the get go, I still found this book irresistibly hard to put down.  This was also an instance where reading outside of my usual comfort zone paid off and it's an experience I definitely recommend.  The ARC I read also had an excerpt from the author's next book, which is scheduled to come out in 2024 — it sounds just as charming and I look forward to reading it!

Received ARC from Berkley via NetGalley.

Review: Our Last Days in Barcelona (by Chanel Cleeton)

My Rating:  4.5 stars

I've read all of the books in Chanel Cleeton's Cuban series about the Perez family and have enjoyed each one (though some more than others).  Of course, the one that will always be my favorite is the first book from 2018, Next Year in Havana, which introduced us to the Perez siblings and the entire extended family.  Though that first book was essentially from the perspective of the third Perez sister Elisa, it did such a great job laying the story groundwork for this fascinating family that by the end of it, I was hoping we would get additional books for each of the other sisters as well.  That wish was granted in 2019 when Cleeton published her second book in the series, When We Left Cuba, which is from the perspective of fiery and passionate second sister Beatriz (who, remains one of the most beloved characters from the Perez family saga).  After that, as Cleeton indicates in her Author's Note, she took a break from writing about the Perez sisters and instead, came out with 2 novels about the lives of 2 different Perez ancestors — the sisters' aunt Mirta Perez in The Last Train to Key West and their cousin Rosa's grandmother Marina Perez in The Most Beautiful Girl in Cuba. With her newest novel (which published this month), Cleeton returns to the Perez sisters, this time giving us eldest sister Isabel's story with Our Last Days in Barcelona. 

Picking up essentially where When We Left Cuba ended, Our Last Days in Barcelona has Isabel heading from Palm Beach, Florida to Barcelona in Spain to locate her sister Beatriz, who is involved in dangerous intelligence work with the government.  Once there though, Isabel finds herself partnering with an unlikely ally, Beatriz's friend Diego, with whom she eventually forms a close bond.  But that's not all — in Beatriz's apartment, Isabel discovers a photograph of herself at barely 2 years old, sitting with her mother Alicia Perez in a Barcelona cafe meeting with a mysterious man — though when Isabel asks her mother about the photo, she vehemently denies ever having been in Barcelona.  While looking for her sister, Isabel also unearths additional fragments of the story behind the photograph, which eventually changes her life in profound ways. In an alternating timeline between present day (1964) and the past (1936), the story of Isabel's mother Alicia as well as her father Emilio's cousin Rosa unfold.  Later, both timelines intertwine as Isabel faces some of the same struggles and family expectations that her mother did 28 years ago — in the end, will Isabel choose the same path her mother does or will she follow her heart instead?  

In this novel, Cleeton does the same wonderful job as she did with her previous 4 novels conveying the historical context related to Cuba, though this time, it's the country's relationship with Spain and the civil war that occurred there that provides the backdrop for Isabel's and Alicia's stories.  One of the reasons I like reading historical fiction is to learn about historical time periods, events, people, places, etc. that I didn't know about, which has certainly been the case with Cleeton's works.  Though the Perez family is fictional, Cleeton has done such a great job developing these richly nuanced characters (especially the Perez women) that I couldn't  help feeling as though I was reading about a real family (as mentioned in my review of the first book in this series, Cleeton herself is Cuban-American and actually wove in some of her own family's history as well as experiences fleeing from Cuba into the Perez family story).  Each time I read one of Cleeton's books featuring a character from the Perez family, I feel like going back and re-reading Next Year in Havana all over again (the only thing holding me back from doing a re-read of any book is my overflowing TBR and a dogged determination to get through every single book on the list), since that's the book that kicked things off and first introduced us to the family.  

Speaking of the characters— up until this point, my favorite Perez sibling was Beatriz and while I still love her dearly (especially her fiery and defiant personality), I've also come around to Isabel too now and consider her a favorite as well.  I also appreciated how we were given additional insight into Alicia as a character and the background of some of the things that happened in her life during her youth that eventually shaped the woman she became later (especially in the context of her role as wife, mother, and Perez family matriarch).  I'm not sure whether Cleeton will write another book about the Perez siblings (my guess is yes, as there is still one more Perez sister's story left to tell — youngest sister Maria's), but having followed this fictional family from the beginning, there's no doubt that I will want to read that book as well (if / whenever it comes into being).  While technically it's not necessary to read the previous 2 books about the Perez sisters in order to read this one, I do recommend doing so only because you get the full background of the family history — which, for me, makes a huge difference in terms of reading experience.  Even if Cleeton's next novel won't be about the Perez sisters specifically, I'm pretty sure she will incorporate another character from the Perez family into it — identifying the connection between the characters in each of her books to the ones in the original story (as well as to her other books) is part of the "fun" of reading her novels, at least for me.

Received ARC from Berkeley Books via Edelweiss.

Review: Red Thread of Fate (by Lyn Liao Butler)

My Rating:  3.5 stars

This book started off strong, with the defining event of the accident that kills two of the main characters — Tony Kwan and his cousin Mia — occurring within the first couple of pages.  From there, the story focuses on the aftermath of the accident and those left behind: Tony's grieving widow Tam, who ends up with legal guardianship of Mia's five-year-old daughter Angela.  At the same time, Tam receives the acceptance letter that she and Tony had been waiting for — the letter confirming their adoption of a son from an orphanage in China — which she will now have to decide whether to go through with on her own. As she tries to pick up the pieces of her life, Tam also has to reckon with her husband's and his estranged cousin's pasts, as well as deal with a long-held secret that could upend everything.

I'm actually a little torn with this one, as there were quite a few aspects of it that I enjoyed, but at the same time, I also felt parts of the story fell a little flat in some places.  One thing that surprised me is that I didn't feel anything emotionally for any of the characters, which I wasn't expecting given my shared cultural background with these characters (Chinese American) and also a certain familiarity with their struggles from an immigrant story perspective.  It's not that the characters weren't likable, because they were, but I guess I was expecting a little more depth to some of the characters than what came across in the story.  I also had a little bit of an issue with the way Angela was portrayed in the story, as I didn't feel at any point that she was only five years old — the way she came across based on how she acted and talked in nearly every scene, I felt like I was reading about someone in her teens at least (there were even a few instances where Angela seemed to act more like an "adult" than Tam). In the end, this uneven portrayal of the characters impacted my reading experience more than I was hoping it would.

Having said all that, I still appreciated the story overall and the writing was solid (though the plot was very much predictable and the ending I wasn't too fond of).   I'm glad I read this one and at some point, I hope to pick up Lyn Liao Butler's first book, The Tiger Mom's Tale, while waiting to see what she has in store next. 

Received ARC from Berkley Books via NetGalley.

Review: The Most Beautiful Girl in Cuba by Chanel Cleeton

My Rating: 4 stars

So far, I have read all 4 of Chanel Cleeton's historical fiction novels and have enjoyed all of them.  Starting with Next Year in Havana, which first introduced us to the Perez family and their subsequent exodus from Cuba, then later her follow-up novel When We Left Cuba, where she continued the family's story after their arrival in the United States, to last year's standalone novel The Last Train to Key West, and now her most recent release The Most Beautiful Girl in Cuba, Cleeton not only pays tribute to her own Cuban heritage, she also sheds light on a few little-known historical events that have been fascinating to learn about.  

 

This time around, in her latest work, Cleeton tells the story of Evangelina Cisneros, a real-life Cuban woman who was part of the fight for Cuba's independence from Spanish occupation at the end of the nineteenth century.  At the age of only eighteen, Evangelina  was separated from her family and unjustly thrown into a Havana jail notorious for its squalid conditions.  When Evangelina's situation is brought to the attention of an American audience via New York newspaper reporters stationed in Cuba, she suddenly finds herself thrust into the international spotlight – in addition to being dubbed "the most beautiful girl in Cuba" by the media, she also becomes a rallying cry on the political front for those pushing American intervention in Cuba.  At the same time, Marina Perez is separated from her beloved husband Mateo when he goes off to join the Cuban revolutionaries – shortly afterward, she and her 7-year-old daughter Isabella and mother-in-law Luz lose everything they own when Spanish soldiers burn down their farm and force them into reconcentration camps where, in order to survive, Marina secretly works as a courier passing messages  to the revolutionaries.  Meanwhile, in New York, Grace Harrington lands a dream job as a female journalist at the Journal, run by famous newspaper tycoon William Randolph Hearst, where she hopes to catch that one big scoop that will allow her to be taken seriously as an independent woman trying to prove herself in the ruthless world of news media.   The lives of these 3 women converge and are changed forever when the situation in Cuba becomes most dire and the United States is spurred into war with Spain for control over the territory.

 

Once again, Cleeton tells a compelling story from the alternating perspectives of 3 women whose backgrounds and circumstances couldn't be more different, yet they are brought together with the common goal of fighting for freedom – whether for themselves as individuals or for their country.  As was the case with Cleeton's previous books, the story features strong female protagonists who defy convention as well as the restrictions placed upon them by society, ultimately rising above their circumstances with courage and grace.   Having said that though, there was one slight difference I noticed this time around:  with Cleeton's previous book, which was also narrated from the different perspectives of the 3 main female characters, I had actually liked all 3 story arcs equally – with this one though, I actually preferred Marina's and Grace's story arcs to Evangelina's, which is a bit ironic given Evangelina's story is technically the main arc that everything else revolves around.  It didn't occur to me at first, but after I read the Author's Note -- where Cleeton explains how, with Evangelina's story, most of the sources available, including the autobiography of her life, were written by people associated with Hearst's New York Journal newspaper, which was locked in a fierce circulation battle with the rival paper run by Joseph Pulitzer at the time, so unfortunately, much of the information was sensationalized and likely overdramatized in order to attract buyers, making it hard to separate the true facts of Evangelina's life from the embellished ones – it made sense why Evangelina's story arc felt a bit "off" to me (I realize now that what was "off" with the story was that it felt too incredulous and farcical – by comparisons, both Marina's and Grace's stories felt much more realistic). For me, I would've preferred Marina's story to be the main one — I think the book overall would've been more powerful and emotional if that had been the case.

With all that said, I still enjoyed this quite a bit.  Chanel Cleeton is a great storyteller and writer — when reading her books, it's easy to become absorbed and lose yourself in the stories she crafts based off her thorough and extensive research.  I also love the way she weaves a connection to the Perez name through all of her books (some more subtly than others) — every time I read one of her books, I feel compelled to go back and re-read Next Year in Havana again to find the connection. Cleeton's books have definitely become "must-reads" for me and of course, I look forward to seeing what she has in store for us next, both from a story and character perspective (and yes, I will continue to look for the Perez connection as well)!

Received ARC from Berkley via Edelweiss.

Review: The Last Train to Key West (by Chanel Cleeton)

My Rating:  4.5 stars

Chanel Cleeton is quickly becoming one of my favorite authors.  I read her two previous historical fiction novels (Next Year in Havana and When We Left Cuba) both of which revolved around the Perez family from Cuba, and absolutely loved both books!   After finding out last year that Cleeton would have a new book out some time in 2020, I knew that I definitely had to get my hands on a copy as soon as it became available.  Her newest work, The Last Train to Key West, is a bit of a departure from her previous works in that it isn’t connected (not directly anyway) to the same Perez family, plus the story is markedly different in its depiction of a specific historical event that occurred over Labor Day weekend in 1935 — the devastating hurricane that struck the Florida Keys, one of the deadliest in the history of the United States.  With that said though, one similarity that threads through all 3 of Cleeton’s historical works is that they all feature strong female protagonists who rise above the restrictions placed upon them by society — not only that, but the characters are written in a non-stereotypical yet realistic way that makes them more relatable.   

In this book, the story is told from the perspectives of 3 women whose backgrounds and personalities are very different, but who happen to cross paths when they are simultaneously impacted by the storm and its deadly aftermath.  Helen, a pregnant waitress working at a local diner in the Key West area where she grew up, yearns to escape the abusive marriage she has been trapped in for 9 years.  Mirta, who agreed to an arranged marriage in order to help out her family back in Cuba, is determined to know the man she married as she arrives in Key West with him for their honeymoon.  Elizabeth, a once-wealthy debutante whose family fell from grace after the Wall Street crash, travels from her home in New York to the Great War veteran camps in Key West with the hope of finding the relative whom she believes can save her from her current predicament.  Though the narrative was told from the alternating first person viewpoints of these 3 characters, their voices were distinctive, which is important because this type of structure is not easy to get right on a consistent basis. Chanel Cleeton is one of the authors who does this well — in addition, Cleeton writes in a way that captivates and draws the reader in, which is another reason why I enjoy her books.

I actually devoured this one in 2 sittings and even then, didn’t want the story to end.  I definitely recommend picking this one up, whether for the absorbing story or the strong characters.  Cleeton is an author who doesn’t disappoint and I truly look forward to what she has in store for us next!

Received ARC from Berkley via Edelweiss.