Elizabeth Acevedo is hot or miss for me. I’ve read most of her YA books so was excited to read something more adult from her. Unfortunately this wasn’t for me. It was beautifully written but the plot was severely lacking and there were too many characters to keep track of.

This beautiful book flawlessly weaves together the history of all the female members of a family. Reading it is like watching a quilt come together, piece by piece, and you’re wrapped up in the coziness as you read.

This is not a fairy tale family filled with rainbows and butterflies and bullshit. The stories are raw, unfiltered, and realistic.

It is an interesting but not always uplifting read.

Elizabeth Acevedo is such a spectacular writer and I will always read what she puts out. I think that this new foray into adult literature is a great fit for her to really showcase her talent for storytelling.

I do enjoy the quicker pace of her YA books and felt that this one dragged a bit at times, but that may be because I had read another family drama novel right before it.

Her characters will entertain you and move you.

Overall, it is a fantastic read! I look forward to reading more of her adult books in the future!

Thank you to #netgalley for this ARC of #familylore

I’ve read everything Elizabeth Acevedo has written and she simply does not miss. This was Acevedo's first adult novel and it is a beautifully written multi-generational family drama spanning countries and decades. The majority of the book takes place during the few days leading up to one of the family member’s living wake. It’s told through the point of view of the women of the family and I was sad when I finished it. They are each so unique and fun to read about. Once this is published in August, I hope the first few pages includes a family tree to see how the characters are related.

Elizabeth Acevedo's work as a novelist is out of this world. She creates these rich characters and a family where you can feel yourself a part of the drama. This book is as much about the family she describes, as it is about all of our families and how we accept or deny the truths about who we are and our gifts. Beautifully written and powerful. I highly recommend this book.

Thank you @netgalley for the ARC of Family Lore by Elizabeth Acevedo. It was a beautiful novel of family dynamic and magical realism. Acevedo weaves together the stories of all of the characters seamlessly.

Flor has the ability to predict when someone will die. She decides to have a living wake for herself, which sends the family into a tail spin.
The story begins with the lead up to the wake and tells the story of her sisters and cousins. Each of them are harboring their own secrets of infidelity, feelings, and fertility. I have loved everything I've read by her and this was a phenomenal adult debut.

Elizabeth Acevedo is one of the best voices of our time. In this novel, she delves into a Dominican American family through the eyes of the women, each of whom have a special gift. Flor's gift is to forsee a person's death. And after a particular dream, she decides to hold her own living wake, causing speculation among her family. The generations come together to celebrate her life. Each of the women tell their own story and share their gifts.

What a beautifully written book but what else could we expect from a wordsmith like Elizabeth Acevedo?! I could not put this book down, wanting to know more and more about this family. Seeing snippets of their lives present and past gave us a good idea of the lives of the Marte women and their own specific struggles & gifts. I loved the magical realism aspects of the women and how that helped to put the story along. I did have to go back to the first page to remember each of the women because there were so many characters, I would say that was the only fault. Too many well-rounded characters! I loved seeing the poetic writing style of Acevedo in a book written for adults and look forward to reading more of her work in the future.

Lovely book!

Elizabeth Acevedo wrote an enchanting book Centering on the life’s of women from different generations whose familial thread is beautifully captured in the story.

We need more stories of women and their special gifts. To know their stories; the good and bad. All of it.

Thank you to NetGalley and Ecco for the eARC of this novel.

I love Elizabeth Acevedo's YA work and was so excited to see her debut adult fiction novel. This novel centers on a family - specifically the women of the family, their unique gifts, their relationships, and the challenges each experience while intertwining the stories.

I absolutely shed some tears throughout this book and felt strongest about Yadi. I will read anything Acevedo writes.

I've been a big fan of Acevedo's books for young adults and was looking forward to reading her debut novel for adults. As they previously have been, her characters are well developed and easy to connect with, but the overall organization of the novel gave me a bit of a headache. The plot was interesting so I stuck with it, but it was a difficult read for me.

To preface the rest of my review, there are a LOT of key characters. There's a brief list of who's who in the beginning, but something visual would have helped me more. A character map or a family tree (something graphic) would have better explained how all the characters are connected, and would have been easier for me to snap a picture of on my phone to reference while I continued the book.

Ona (one of the granddaughters) is interviewing different family members and that is why the point of view shifts so often. I wish that was explained earlier in the book, instead of 18% into the book in the middle of a Pastora chapter...

"One had been asking the women in the family all these questions... Pastora had agreed to the interviews, convinced she'd lived a long and colorful life and would have a lot to offer her inquisitive niece..."

Sometimes the story is being told from the point of view of that specific character, but sometimes it's Ona narrating - I wish it was more clear which was happening because I'd go a few pages in a new chapter before figuring out who's perspective I was reading from. There are also flashbacks that don't really have a transition to alert you that you've moved backwards in time until you're a few paragraphs in.

The organization made the book difficult to follow, but I liked the characters and the storyline.

This book is just stunning. Acevedo’s writing and storytelling is so gorgeous and this story of family, secrets, and love was wonderful.

Love this author and this book! I will be recommending this to everyone!. Thanks so much to NetGalley and the publisher for the ARC.

Thanks to Netgalley for a chance for an early read.

This books is stunning. The weaving of the Marte sisters’ stories is beautiful. Acevedo honors her own history of voices while also creating this beautiful, messy, complicated real tale of generations of women.

Her first adult novel is gorgeous and I hope it’s the first of many.

When Flor, one of four Marte sisters who possess special affinities (and who specifically is a seer of deaths), begins planning her living wake, it sends a ripple of concern and gossip through the family. Told through a series of interviews conducted by Flor's daughter, Ona, we learn the history and secrets of the tightly-knit family across generations.

Confronting the moments that don't go the way their hearts may want, making decisions they may regret, watching opportunities come back around, there is so much love and heart in this family. I loved each flaw that made them!

This was my first Elizabeth Acevedo read and I'm eager to read more of her offerings!

Thank you to Netgalley and Ecco for this advanced copy. All opinions expressed are my own.

There's just something so captivating about families, their complexities and the magic that courses through them. Elizabeth Acevedo wrote such a stunning books about generational trauma, healing, the bonds between siblings and the desire to not just be alive, but to actually live.

Flora, Matilde, Pastora and Camilla are incredible characters. Their voices felt distinct and unique, at no point did I feel like the chapters blurred together due to confusing writing. This applies to the rest of the family as well. Honestly, I wished I could hug this book because it's so beautifully crafted and it feels as though the characters are completely real.

Highly recommend this!

I have put off writing a review because it is not enough to say that this book was insanely good, but that's how I feel. I am and English teacher and lover of literature; this is literature. Having read Elizabeth Acevedo's YA works, I was prepared for a powerful novel, but I could not have imagined the ways in which I came to understand that she is one of the voices of our generation. Reading _Family Lore_ I felt as if I could see Acevedo ascending to her seat beside Morrison, Alvarez and Garcia Marquez. Acevedo deftly handles the shifting narrative of a family of women (mothers, aunties, grandmothers, cousins, sisters and daughters) all experiencing the consequences of generational trauma, patriarchal culture (both in the DR and the US) and colonialism, and the ways they step into their power. At times I felt echos of _In the Time of Butterflies_ or _One Hundred Years of Solitude_, at others, _Oscar Wao_; however, _Family Lore_ is a feminine text through and through powered by strong female characters and their distinct experiences as women becoming themselves. One stroke of brilliance (among many in this text) is that Ona, the central narrator, is a sociologist studying the under examined histories of the Dominican Republic and the diaspora. This enables Acevedo to provide historical context at key moments through this character's understanding of the world and the ways that this and other histories cannot be separated from the experiences of the individuals our societies produce. The current nature of the novel with references to 2000s hiphop and social media pull the magical pieces of the family into present day, and the ways this multigenerational family confronts life feel like something altogether new. Facing questions of death, love, marriage, selfhood, boundaries, women's bodies and what it means to live one's life, the complexity of the characters and the various ways they understand their shared stories is stunning. I am not a re-reader of books, but I will be reading this again.

The setting and descriptions of the DR were the strong point of this book for me. Ultimately, I had a hard time keeping all of the characters and nuclear family groupings straight.

I was thrilled to see Elizabeth Acevedo tackle the adult genre with Family Lore. This family drama is told from multiple POV. A captivating and immersive story told in Acevedo's classic prose. Beautiful writing, rich characters, and even pacing. A thought provoking read

Parts of this book I really enjoyed and some not as much. Certainly many interesting characters in this Dominican family. I enjoyed the magical realism and Spanish sprinkled throughout. Some of the references to sex though felt superfluous as if an editor said add some more spice. In my opinion it would have been a stronger book without it. Definitely an entertaining read though. I would like to read some of Acevedo’s poetry next.

Elizabeth Acevedo has the most beautiful poetic way with words and in her first adult novel her language is as poetic, gorgeous and moving as always. Flor decides, after seeing a documentary her daughter recommended, that she wants to have a living wake. She sees it as a chance to have a party and say her goodbyes while she is still alive. The problem is that like all her sisters Flor has a gift, to see death, and he desire for this party worries her sisters, daughter and nieces as her announcing her impending death. As they prepare for the wake the history of their lives unfolds across the pages, lives filled with love, pain, laughter and sometimes pain and abuse. A love letter to families and the bonds they hold and to the power of women this book is also a love letter to the Dominican Republic. A fantastic and gorgeous read.