The Roots of the Olive Tree by Courtney Miller Santo

This is Courtney Miller Santo's debut novel. Put simply this book tells the story of a family of 'superagers.' A superager is someone who has longer than average longevity. An example would be someone whose chronological age is 100 while their biological age is that of someone in their 60's.

The Keller women are five generations of first born daughters most of whom have long outlived husbands, children and friends. Anna's the 112 year old matriarch; she lives with her daughter Bets and Bets' daughter Callie in a house on the family's beloved olive orchard. Callie's daughter Deb is in prison, but is up for parole. Deb's daughter Erin's unexpected and sudden homecoming coincides with the arrival of a geneticist who hopes to study these women in order to unlock the secret of aging. Erin, who's returned home pregnant, is determined to aid her mother in her bid for parole.

The story shifts perspective as time moves along in the book. It starts with Anna's perspective in which we learn how her parents came to California and started the olive orchard. Then it shifts to the perspectives of her daughter and granddaughters. In each part we learn a little more about the history of this family, their secrets, and their relationships--but really only a little.

Even though these women share the same family and the same house, there are fault lines and divisive cracks in their relationships, estrangements and distances between mother and daughter. Complicated personalities and histories are mitigated by the privacies and secrets and suspicions each woman holds close and dear to her heart and hidden away from the others. One can't help but wonder what Deb's homecoming and the birth of Erin's baby, the sixth generation in this remarkable family, will do to the delicate dynamics of the family. Are they headed for more heartbreak, tragedy and disaster? Or will the broken pieces finally be healed?

Ultimately this is a quick read of a family drama. This is the type of book in which it feels as if not much happens even though a lot actually does happen if that makes sense. This feeling is due in part to the characters' development--we only get in depth depiction of a certain character within that character's perspective section. Even then it still feels as if not a lot is revealed of the character's feelings, motivations or relationships with other characters. The family dynamics are given only a surface level portrayal. These women keep secrets from each other and there's great difficulty and often strain in the relationships between mother and daughter but why are these relationships strained and in what ways? The lack of illumination, development and elaboration of the various histories of the relationships fails to tell us these answers. The narrative structure of the book also handicaps any in depth examination of the relationships as well.

--Reviewed by Ms. Angie

In The Woods by Tana French

"What I warn you to remember is that I am a detective. Our relationship with the truth is fundamental, but cracked, refracting confusingly like fragmented glass. It is the core of our careers, the endgame of every move we make, and we pursue it with strategies painstakingly constructed of lies ... and every variation on deception. The truth is the most desirable woman in the world and we are the most jealous lovers, reflexively denying anyone else the slightest glimpse of her. We betray her routinely ... This is my job ... What I am telling you, before you begin my story, is this--two things: I crave truth. And I lie." opening lines of In The Woods chapter 1, pages 3-4 In The Woods by Tana French, an Irish writer, is an extremely well-written and well-crafted mystery novel. The downside is that this is French's debut novel, and her website (located at http://www.tanafrench.com/ ) does not off...

Broken by Karin Slaughter

Before I begin the formal review there are a few things I need to get off my chest in the wake of finishing this book; I'll do so without giving away too many (or any) spoilers. The OUTRAGE!: the identity of Detective Lena Adams' new beau; the low depths to which Grant County's interim chief has sunk and brought the police force down with him; agent Will Trent's wife, Angie's, sixth sense/nasty habit of reappearing in his life just when he's slipping away from her. Thank God for small miracles though because while Angie was certainly referred to during the book, the broad didn't make an appearance. One sign that I've become way too invested in these characters is that I'd like to employ John Connolly's odd pair of assassins, Louis and Angel, to contract out a hit on Angie; do you think Karin Slaughter and John Connolly could work out a special cross over? Hallelujah: Dr. Sara Linton and agent Will Trent are both back. There is no hallelujah fo...

Generation Kill by Evan Wright and One Bullet Away by Nathaniel Fick

Non-fiction books aren't really my thing; generally, this is how my relationship goes with non-fiction books: I see a really interesting one, I borrow it, I start to read it, and then I ditch it a chapter or two later when the dry, boring writing and non-existent plot fail to hook me. However, this a review of two non-fiction books that I read back to back after a five year old three article series that I dug up on the internet; it was written by Evan Wright and preceded his book Generation Kill , which is basically a book version of the article series that he wrote and published in Rolling Stone Magazine . Recently HBO adapted Generation Kill into a mini-series that ran sometime last year; I got the series on DVD and in the midst of watching it, I decided I wanted to get my hands on the book to read. In the meantime, I stumbled across One Bullet Away by Nathaniel Fick, the lieutenant of the platoon that Wright embedded with, and I read that book while I waited for Generation K...

A Series Of (Un)Fortunate Reviews

Search This Blog