Coster, Naima

Recommend to listeners who enjoy family sagas.

Deploying multiple voices does diminish the depth of character development, but Coster’s cast of characters is unique, creating a tapestry that allows the various individuals to explore a past they may try to escape but can’t leave behind completely. Despite its sprawling time line and multiple perspectives, the novel remains an intimate portrait of families shaped by love, motherhood, race, and class.

Recommended for contemporary public library collections. ["Coster's realistic depictions of these two hurt and angry women and the broken man who connects them will haunt readers while making them flinch, gasp, and quite possibly cry…. not to be missed": LJ 1/18 starred review of the Little A hc.]