Bottom line:  I loved this book.

From Goodreads:

“Set within a contemporary black community in Southern California, Brit Bennett’s mesmerizing first novel is an emotionally perceptive story about community, love, and ambition. It begins with a secret.

In entrancing, lyrical prose, The Mothers asks whether a “what if” can be more powerful than an experience itself. If, as time passes, we must always live in servitude to the decisions of our younger selves, to the communities that have parented us, and to the decisions we make that shape our lives forever.”

So, I copied that from Goodreads because I will never write something like, “entrancing, lyrical prose”…  Even though I was an English minor a hundred years ago, I can never find words like that when I’m talking about books I love and I LOVED this book.

First things first…  Spoiler alert!  I’m going to talk about the book and I’m not going to worry about spoiling the book.  This isn’t The Girl on the Train.  There isn’t a crazy plot twist.  You’ll live. 

Second up…  This book takes on some heavy issues, including teen pregnancy, abortion, suicide, infertility, and infidelity, so if you are sensitive or feel you might get triggered, this book and this review are definitely not for you.

Okay?  Okay.

So why did I love this book? 

While it’s true that I love a good psychological thriller, I LOVE books where the characters become my friends and I know them and love them and cry when they cry.  Technically, the book is about Nadia, Luke, and Aubrey, and how their lives and relationships intertwine throughout their teens and early adulthood.  There were pieces of each of their lives and stories that found their way into my heart and soul and I found myself loving and hating each of them in turn (well, not Aubrey.  You can’t ever really hate Aubrey).  But it was The Mothers that sealed the deal for me.

            “Besides, what did a bunch of old ladies know?

            We would’ve told her that all together, we got centuries on her.  If we laid all our lives toes to heel, we were born before the Depression, the Civil War, even America itself.  In all that living, we have known men.  Oh girl, we have known littlebit love.  That littlebit of honey left in an empty jar that traps the sweetness in your mouth long enough to mask your hunger.  We have run tongues over teeth to savor that last littlebit as long as we could, and in all our living, nothing has starved us more.”

I loved this book because Brit Bennett paints pictures with her words that made me feel ALL THE FEELS.  I was listening to this in my car on the way to work one morning and I actually had to sit in the parking lot and get ahold of myself before I could go in.  Have you ever seen two friends that just fit together and you just wanted a part of that?  Or a couple that were so perfect together you just wanted to know what they were doing right?  Or have you ever hung around with a family that you knew really liked each other and had fun together and you knew that no matter what they would always be there for each other and you just really, really wanted to be a part of THAT family?

            “Sometimes Nadia envied Aubrey, even though she felt guilty for considering the thought.  Aubrey had lost her mother too, but she was loved by her sister and her sister’s girlfriend and even the first lady, three women who cared for her only because they wanted to.  Both girls had been abandoned in the sand.  But only Aubrey had been found.  Only Aubrey had been chosen.

            Monique and Kasey’s love for Aubrey hung in their eyes, and even though it wasn’t meant for Nadia, she inched closer, holding her hands up to its warmth.”     

I could seriously go on and on about why I love this book, but I’ll end with even though suicide, abortion, and infidelity are controversial topics, I never felt like Brit Bennett was preaching at me.  You know without a doubt that Nadia feels guilty because she believes that by being born, she robbed her mother of her future and forced her to live the life of “less”.  When Nadia discovers she’s pregnant, it’s hard to judge her for refusing to give up her dreams of getting out of her small California town and going away to college.  And yet, I felt Luke’s remorse over the abortion. I understood his frustration and helplessness.  I watched a friend go through this when we were in college and he desperately wanted to keep the baby and his girlfriend had an abortion.  It was heartbreaking. 

            “She wanted this baby and that was the difference: magic you wanted was a miracle, magic you didn’t want was a haunting.”

Nadia’s mother’s suicide permeates the book and affects each of the characters differently. Grief and remorse are themes throughout the book, but it was hard to read that as a mother and imagining doing that to my own child.  Their might have been little tears in my eyes many times during this book.

            “She still searched for clues, for strange things her mother had done or said, for signs that she should have noticed.  At least then, her mother’s death would make sense.  But she couldn’t think of any hints that her mother had wanted to die.  Maybe she’d never really known her mother at all.  And if you couldn’t know the person whose body was your first home, then who could you ever know?”

Despite the heavy topics, despite the fact that my eyes leaked repeatedly while I read this, I would recommend this as a beach read, and I would definitely recommend this for a book club (as long as your book club is able to discuss sensitive topics civilly).  Loved this book and I can see re-reading this at least one more time.

So what about you? Can you think of a book where you connected so closely to the characters that their tears were your tears? What about a book that you went back and read passages out loud because you loved the way they sounded in your head? Tell me about an author that did a great job handling delicate topics and maybe challenged you to think outside of your normal comfort zone. Tell me! I’m down to 761 books on my TBR on my Goodreads… let’s hear your favs because really, I’m getting a little nervous I might run out of things to read!