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    In Search of Us
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    In Search of Us
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    In Search of Us
    Ebook371 pages3 hours

    In Search of Us

    By Ava Dellaira

    4/5

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    About this ebook

    This sweeping multi-generational love story introduces readers to mother-and-daughter pair Marilyn and Angie. To seventeen-year-old Angie, who is mixed-race, Marilyn is her hardworking, devoted white single mother. But Marilyn was once young, too. When Marilyn was seventeen, she fell in love with Angie's father, James, who was African-American. But Angie's never met him, and Marilyn has always told her he died before she was born. When Angie discovers evidence of an uncle she's never met she starts to wonder: What if her dad is still alive, too? So she sets off on a journey to find him, hitching a ride to LA from her home in New Mexico with her ex-boyfriend, Sam. Along the way, she uncovers some hard truths about herself, her mother, and what truly happened to her father.
    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherMacmillan Publishers
    Release dateMar 6, 2018
    ISBN9780374305338
    Author

    Ava Dellaira

    Ava Dellaira is a graduate of the Iowa Writers’ Workshop, where she was a Truman Capote Fellow. She grew up in Albuquerque, New Mexico, and received her undergraduate degree from the University of Chicago. Love Letters to the Dead is her debut novel. She currently lives in Santa Monica

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    4/5

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    • 4/5
      Seventeen year old Marilyn feels trapped. She has grown up as a child actor and model, touted from agent to agent to fulfil her mother’s desire to find fame and fortune, to provide an escape from the poverty which has led them to having to move in with a volatile, disagreeable uncle. All Marilyn wants is to be able to make her own decisions, to go to university and move as far away from the superficial glitter of Hollywood as possible. Then she falls in love with James, the boy downstairs who shows her that life in the present can also be good. However, she also discovers that nothing stays the same, that life can change in an instant.Angie is also seventeen and has been lovingly brought up single-handedly by her mother, Marilyn. She is mixed-race and knows little about her father, other than that he had died before she was born. She has felt his absence throughout her life and has always wanted to know more about him; the story her mother has told her doesn’t quite add up and she becomes aware that her mother has lied about the past. When she discovers a photograph, hidden in one of her mother’s drawers, of her mother looking totally in love with a young man, she becomes convinced that this is her father and becomes determined to find out more about her background. A chance discovery leads her to leave home and set off to Los Angeles, in search of someone who may be her unknown uncle, the brother of her father, and maybe she will discover that her father is, after all, still alive. Will her discoveries enable her to finally establish who she is and where she belongs, as well as why her mother has lied to her for so long?This moving and engaging story is told from two perspectives, Marilyn’s during the late 1990’s and Angie’s in the present and explores their parallel quests for identity. These switches in time were handled very well and served to slowly uncover the various events which had led to Angie’s desperate need to establish her own identity. The story explored several disturbing themes, including physical and sexual abuse, racism, addiction and police brutality and I thought that these were dealt with in a sensitive, non-exploitative way, adding a credible depth to the story-telling.The parallels in the stories of these two characters ran throughout the novel and served to highlight that past, unresolved conflicts are ever-present in the here and now and need to be dealt with in order to enable people to enjoy proper freedom of choice. Both Marilyn and Angie had suffered losses which had had an impact on how they related to each other and to other people and the story explored how important it is to know about one’s roots in order to feel safe and secure. It is often the little things, emerging from shared memories, looking at old photographs etc., which help to give us a sense of belonging and connectedness and the story illustrated well how insecure a person can feel if these are missing. It also highlighted that no one should be expected to live someone else’s dreams; we all need to feel free to follow our own.I thought that the characterisations were convincing and that the self-absorbed angst of adolescence was well captured. I found it very easy to begin to care about the fates of each of the characters and this meant that I soon found myself emotionally engaged with their struggles, at times to the extent that I was moved to tears. I also felt that the writing captured a very vivid sense of time and place.The nature of the themes explored make this is a thought-provoking book and, as such, I think it would make a good choice for reading groups. My thanks to Readers First and Hot Key Books for sending me a copy of this book in exchange for an honest review.