A review by jackelz
Long Live the Tribe of Fatherless Girls, by T Kira Madden

challenging emotional reflective
T Kira Madden was born to a single Chinese, Kānaka Maoli (Hawaiian) mother and a Jewish father who was married to someone else at the time. Even though her father divorced his first wife and married Madden's mother when the author was still quite young, he was absent from her life — hence the title, which also nods to the death of her father in early 2016. Both of Madden's parents were, in fact, absent in different ways throughout her youth, largely due to addiction. 
 
She stood out in her private school and was bullied for her appearance; she was the horse girl who had a back brace, headgear, braces; she was called "Kinky Chinky,” and she lived in extravagance with her designer shoe-brand name. 

 At times the stories seem random, and the book wasn’t formatted like a traditional memoir. There isn’t much of a lesson to learn from her experiences, but I understood her longing for connection. Her childhood was absolutely wild, and me being the same age as her, there was a lot that felt familiar. 
 
Madden holds nothing back in these pages. It's a story about trauma and forgiveness, reckoning with her queer and biracial identity, about families of blood and affinity. Part 3 was my favorite and I could read a book just about that. 
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