Far From the Tree

Far From the Tree follows three siblings who have all been (for lack of being able to find better language) put up for adoption by their mother. Grace is a teen who has just had a baby she is choosing to let a couple adopt, Maya is the youngest of the three and has a family that loves her but is on the verge of crumbling under their own secrets, and Joaquin is the oldest who is still in the foster system, he is dealing with major self-esteem issues compounded by the ways he has experienced the world in the past.

So right from hearing the pitch for this book, I knew I would love it. I also knew it would make me sad, which is maybe why I didn't pick it up right away, which I now see was obviously a mistake. In my defense, I did buy the book right away.

I love family books. I obviously like a good found family story, but I really love a substantial exploration about the ways in which you are similar and different to your family. I also am interested in the exploration of the secrets and insular nature of the family. This book explores one family that is some ways are four families.

I really connected to each of the families in very different ways. Grace's family is pretty stable and supportive on the surface, but there are some deep-rooted issues that she does not ever know how to resolve. Maya's family has obvious glaring problems but are massively talented at keeping their own secrets. And Joaquin's family is complicated but rapidly approaching stability.

I love all the different family's this book is able to talk about. The story centers on three siblings who were put up for adoption in quick succession. The catalyst for them all meeting is when the eldest girl has a baby at 16 and decides to let her baby be adopted.

This book is full of mystery and tension and secrets. It explores family, race, gender, belonging, and the importance of feeling stable somewhere in the world. I cannot find the correct expression of my love for this book.

I really loved that I was so emotionally invested in this novel that I did not try to dissect it while reading, this was the now rare for me experience of being totally and utterly swept into a story in such a way that my brain unable to forget that I am being told a story. It is also the book that had made me cry the most consistently throughout the whole novel. It felt like almost every chapter (maybe 1-3) I was crying at least once. Real crying, not single tearing it, but I wasn't sobbing either. This book was just very consistent with its ability to get an emotional response from me. And I didn't find this exhausting or overwhelming; I was so happy I was so genuinely interested in this book.

I gave this book 5 stars on Goodreads, and also have this review up on tumblr!