A review by bookbelle5_17
In the Country: Stories by Mia Alvar

dark emotional funny hopeful informative inspiring reflective sad tense slow-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

5.0

Review of “In the Country”
By: Mia Alvar
            This was one of the rare times where I have read a whole collection of short stories and liked all of them.  My theory is that I had felt a personal connection while reading these nine stories.  I thought about my maternal grandmother, my Lola, and did she have similar experiences to the characters of each of these stories? Some of the stories had funny moments and others were serious and sad.  Alvar focused on the 70s and 80s, the time she grew up in and highlights the experiences of Filipino people whether they were in America, Bahrain, or still in the Philippines.  We get perspectives of mothers, sons, daughters, husbands, and wives, and she shows the struggle of loving your country and want to escape the horrors of it.  The bookend stories were the darkest stories to me to read and had the saddest endings.  The one of the stories took place during 9/11.  The food referenced in a couple of the stories wasn’t described in detail, but it did make me hungry. This was a good, but sad story collection that is another step in my journey on connecting more with my Filipino culture.
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