I love a thought provoking plot like this one and it definitely made me think. The beginning is mostly setting up the relationships and preparing for the intensity of the drama that comes up. The writing was slow at times, but I was able to skim around parts that were slow without losing the plot.

Layla is a mixed woman twenty-nine days from her wedding to Andy, a white man, when her best friend sends her a documentary. It is about Jamaican slaves and the money slave owners received when the slaves were emancipated. The hitch to the story is that Layla’s relatives may have been slaves to Andy’s relatives.
Layla is torn as to how this information affects her marrying Andy and decides to travel to Jamaica to the land of her ancestors and dig deep into the slavery story.
I did not quite like the book until one-third in. I felt for Layla and the tremendous dilemma she felt. Her friend Sera was so unlikeable and awful to Layla. There is a true love of family and of the roots evident in the work.
I voluntarily read and reviewed an advanced copy of this book. All thoughts and opinions are my own.

For me, this book would’ve worked much better without the best friend character playing such a prominent (and frankly, manipulative) role

It was a unique and compelling plot but too detailed in some areas, and not detailed enough in others. I had a hard time rooting for the best friendship… it just made me sad. Miscommunication in romance books is irritating AF, but miscommunication this bad between two adult women who grew up together felt truly unbelievable.

If you can look past this, then give it a read. It was well-written and engaging.

Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for an arc!
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This one took me a bit to get into, but I ultimately liked it a lot. I thought the premise was strong — a mixed race woman (Layla) discovering that her fiancé's (Andy) family may have owned her ancestors — certainly involves some thought provoking questions.

As the wedding approaches, Sera, Layla long time best friend, begins pulling away from Layla and makes her question her choice to marry Andy and (to her mind) betray her race.

This was the kind of book where I really didn't know where it would go. I could see a thread where Layla calls off the wedding just as easily as I could see one where she didn't -- no spoilers to which way it went.

I thought the novel was well written and addressed some tough questions -- it shares some DNA with of Acts of Forgiveness which I read recently too.

I struggled with how Sera treated Layla and wondered if I agreed with her behavior. Flashbacks painted a picture of how long and deep their friendship was which made be more upset for how Sera was acting. I think one minor issue I had was that I felt like I didn't really have a grasp on Andy and if I should be rooting for him or not, but maybe that was the point.

Dominoes by Phoebe McIntosh

288 Pages
Publisher: Random House Publishing Group – Random House, Random House Trade Paperbacks
Release Date: March 12, 2024

Fiction (Adult), General Fiction (Adult), Literary Fiction (Adult), OwnVoices, Multicultural

Layla McKinnon and her best friend Sera are teachers. It is the end of term, and they are looking forward to the summer in London. Layla met her fiancé, Any McKinnon, at his sister’s birthday party. Layla is mixed race but can pass as White. Her friend Sera is darker and feels discrimination that Layla has never experienced. After hearing about Black people being abused by police, Sera tells Layla she just does not understand. Her message is “You are not Black enough.”

Watching a documentary about slavery in the United Kingdom, Layla begins to question her relationship with Andy, who is White. She needs to find herself before she can move forward with her life and goes to the Islands where her people came from.

The book has a steady pace, the characters are developed, and it is written in the third person point of view. This is a touchy subject when a Black or mixed-race person is judged because they are not enough. If you enjoy reading multicultural books, you will enjoy this book.

A story of love, friendship, self-discovery, and heritage.
As Layla's wedding date nears, her best friend Sera reveals some concerns about Layla's fiance Andy, and his family's connection to the British slave trade. Layla must dig into her own past to see how their two families may have been connected and decide if she can live with Andy's heritage.
This novel raises some interesting questions, especially for mixed-race couples. For me, it is a window into some considerations I wouldn't have thought about.
Overall, this is a good story of some contemporary issues that we should all be aware of.

Dominoes

⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

This book was so thought provoking. I was so intrigued by the premise, and glad I picked up a copy on @netgalley.

Layla and Andy immediately hit it off when they first meet, and find it amusing that they have the same last name. Layla’s best friend Sera keeps cautioning her about Andy, until a documentary pushes Layla toward some research that leads her to believe Andy’s family owned her ancestors as slaves. Layla digs into her family history and finds what is important for her future as she gets closer and closer to their wedding date.

This book was so heavy but I really enjoyed it. The decisions that Layla had to make were so hard, and I loved watching the intention she put into them. I also loved how she surrounded herself with her family in the process.

4 🌟

This was such a thought provoking read.

This book dealt with a really tough, complex subject but I felt like it was dealt with really well. It was honestly really eye opening how racism exists outside our country and things happening here impacts others.

Thanks, Netgalley for the ARC of this book!

This is a thought provoking story about a woman who finds out her fiancé's ancestors might have owned her ancestors as slaves. This is not a plot heavy book and most of the content is devoted to her thoughts and feelings about this discovery. Overall, an interesting read.

Dominoes, by Phoebe McIntosh is an absolutely beautiful story of family, generational love, commitment and loyalty. The symbolism of the domino blew me away. The author’s art of storytelling was so clear that I could feel all of the characters’ emotions genuinely. I felt the discomfort, the doubt, the fear and the undeniable love throughout, making me love this book even more. An absolute gem.

The premise of this book was what drew me to it. About a month before her wedding, a mixed race woman of Jamaican descent finds out that her white fiancé’s family might have been slave owners of her ancestors.

This book makes you think about racism, reparations, privilege and what the present owes to the past. The author does an outstanding job of pointing out how prevalent racism still is: not just the casual but the bold in your face types.

There are no easy answers here but Phoebe McIntosh does a fantastic job. I love books that make you stop, think and question everything you think you know and believe.

You've finally met the man of your dreams. He's everything one could want in a husband and more. But along comes your best friend with earth shaking news that could ruin everything for you. What is a person to do? Especially when your friend tells you in no uncertain terms, it's either me or him. That is the premise of this wonderful novel by playwright, Paula McIntosh.

The story unfolds in England and Jamaica. It makes you think very hard about the million choices one must make when choosing a mate. Especially when you are both members of a different race.

I loved this book. And I highly recommend it

Layla discovers that her finance’s ancestors enslaved her ancestors through the prompting of her best friend, a social justice advocate. Fascinating story of love and pain, friendship and the loss of friendship, and history that isn’t fully in the past. McIntosh successfully brings her one-woman play to the written word.

This book has layers. I almost bailed on it (because some of the descriptions can get a bit tedious...), but I could not stop thinking about it. I'm glad I went back and finished it.

Thank you #Netgalley for the advance copy!

I found this book well written. It was an interesting story observing Layla’s thoughts and feelings when discovering the history behind her fiancé and her families, but it was also fascinating seeing how her loved ones reacted.

Layla and Andy are about to get married, but as the wedding approaches, her best friend tells her that she needs to do some searching as to her ancestry to answer questions before she get married. When she uncovers a shocking truth about her and Andy's families, can the relationship survive the new information?

The truth of history is shocking to the core, and this novel encapsulates just that! What would you do if you found out your fiance's family likely enslaved your ancestors? This novel delves deep into this topic examining the lives of Layla and Andy. Thank you to NetGalley and Random House Publishing Group - Random House for a copy of this book for an honest review.

First I want to thank Netgalley and Random House Publishing for allowing me to read this advanced copy.

I absolutely loved the idea of this story and was interested to see how it would end up. I kept thinking...could you imagine realizing that the family you are marrying into could have a dark past.

It took me a while to really get into the story. I think it was because I didn't care for Layla or her friend Sera at the beginning. About 40% into the book I was getting more interested in the history. I enjoyed the story, but there were alot of times were it seemed to drag. And sadly, by the end I still did not care for Sera.

3.5/5 stars - a thought-provoking novel that questions just how much of our generational history impacts our present day.

In present-day London, Layla McKinnon is preparing her upcoming marriage to Andy McKinnon; the fact she their last names are the same has always been a point of humor for her, and nothing more. However, as the the date gets closer and Layla's best friend and maid-of-honor Sera starts behaving unexpectedly, Layla comes to question if she should dig further into her family's genealogy - something she's avoided doing as a mixed-race woman who's primarily been raised by her black mother, only hearing in passing about her white father. As she continues looking, she comes to realize the very real possibility that her fiance's ancestors may have enslaved her own family several centuries back - and it calls into question their entire future.

I think the novel does a good job framing a complex problem in a plot that many readers can grasp, and also sheds light on portion of history that often gets overlooked when slavery was rampant; growing up in the US, I wasn't aware of how this was also widespread in other parts of the world like the UK. Layla's journey to Jamaica to reconnect with her extended family and seeing the place her grandfather considers home was also one of my favorite parts of the novel, as it put stories and faces to the people she had only heard about. However, much of the plot felt circular and roundabout and I personally didn't like how Sera's behavior was ultimately overlooked and forgiven in the end.

A fast read that pulled me in, but one that didn't feel fully tied together at the end.

Thank you Random House for the advance copy of the novel!

When Layla's best friend Sera sends Layla a video explaining that Layla's White fiance's racist family might have owned her Black family, Layla is thrown into doubt about race and relationships and what it means to be Black (but sometimes passing as White). Layla agonizes, Sera ends their decades-long friendship, Layla goes to visit her family in Jamaica. There, Layla learns that even Black families had slaves, and that despite them having the same surname, a professional genealogist can't find proof that Layla's fiance owned hers. Layla begins to recognize the microaggressions Sera has been exposed to all her life, and realizes that she needs to do a lot of thinking about how the world treats Black and mixed-race folks. She returns her engagement ring, likely bought with slave trade money, to her fiance, and they buy a new one and get married and everyone who needed to gets a little more woke.

Some of the characters are annoying--Layla, for one--but others are people you'd want to play dominoes with, like her Grandpa. The character development isn't as dramatic as it might have been, and the wedding scenes in which Layla's mother dances with the White father of the groom is a little bit pat. The scenes with Layla teaching are painfully awkward and cringeworthy, but the first person narration of the rest of the book works well and is easy to follow, although as a protagonist, Layla remains a bit vague and blurry.

Finally. the author chose to set the story during the first year of the Covid-19 pandemic, and because of that and the way certain characters react to the lockdowns and recommended safety precautions, the story is also about ableism and disability. I was pretty angry that characters who readers are supposed to like were so thoughtless when it came to keeping others safe. It changed how I viewed some of the characters and made me less sympathetic to Layla and others.