lilifane's review against another edition
adventurous
emotional
hopeful
mysterious
reflective
sad
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
3.0
Although this has a lot of things I like in books, something was missing for me to fully enjoy it.
This is a story about a Chinese American woman, Sylvie, who travels to the Netherlands where part of her family lives and where she spent the first 9 years of her life. She goes there because her grandma is dying, and she wants to see her again before it's too late. But after the funeral, Sylvie disappears. Her younger sister Amy travels to the Netherlands to retrace her footsteps and find her.
The story is told from 3 different point of views (Sylvie, Amy and their mom) which I really enjoyed. You get glimpses of family dynamics, secrets but also microaggressions against Asians not only in the US but also in the Netherlands. Some themes hit a little too close to home and got me all emotional. Others were not my thing, but I get why they were there.
The way the Netherlands were described, from an American point of view, was a little weird. Especially when you're European and live this close to the Netherlands, some observations the American characters made about life here were... kind of funny but also interesting.
Although I think the ending was very emotional, I just didn't like this one main twists at the very end. I guessed it at some point, and it's been done so many times. I also think it was unnecessary. You could have ruined all those lives and broken all those hearts with another secret, in my opinion.
This is a story about a Chinese American woman, Sylvie, who travels to the Netherlands where part of her family lives and where she spent the first 9 years of her life. She goes there because her grandma is dying, and she wants to see her again before it's too late. But after the funeral, Sylvie disappears. Her younger sister Amy travels to the Netherlands to retrace her footsteps and find her.
The story is told from 3 different point of views (Sylvie, Amy and their mom) which I really enjoyed. You get glimpses of family dynamics, secrets but also microaggressions against Asians not only in the US but also in the Netherlands. Some themes hit a little too close to home and got me all emotional. Others were not my thing, but I get why they were there.
The way the Netherlands were described, from an American point of view, was a little weird. Especially when you're European and live this close to the Netherlands, some observations the American characters made about life here were... kind of funny but also interesting.
Although I think the ending was very emotional, I just didn't like this one main twists at the very end. I guessed it at some point, and it's been done so many times. I also think it was unnecessary. You could have ruined all those lives and broken all those hearts with another secret, in my opinion.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Bullying, Car accident, Medical content, Racism, Grief, Death, and Terminal illness
Minor: Incest
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