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Birds of Paradise
A multilayered, beautifully textured novel about family and self, self-indulgence and generosity, against the vivid backdrop of contemporary Miami.
In the tropical paradise that is Miami, Avis and Brian Muir are still haunted by the disappearance of their ineffably beautiful daughter, Felice, who ran away when she was thirteen. Now, after five years of modeling tattoos, skateboarding, clubbing, and sleeping in a squat house or on the beach, Felice is about to turn eighteen. Her family—Avis, an exquisitely talented pastry chef; Brian, a corporate real estate attorney; and her brother, Stanley, the proprietor of Freshly Grown, a trendy food market—will each be forced to confront their anguish, loss, and sense of betrayal. Meanwhile, Felice must reckon with the guilty secret that drove her away, and must face her fear of losing her family and her sense of self forever.
This multilayered novel about a family that comes apart at the seams—and finds its way together again—is totally involving and deeply satisfying, a glorious feast of a book.
368 pages, Hardcover
First published September 6, 2011
About the author
Diana Abu-Jaber
13 books411 followersDiana Abu-Jaber is the award-winning author of Life Without A Recipe, Origin, Crescent, Arabian Jazz, and The Language of Baklava. Her writing has appeared in Good Housekeeping, Ms., Salon, Vogue, Gourmet, the New York Times, The Nation, the Washington Post, and the Los Angeles Times. She divides her time between Fort Lauderdale, Florida, and Portland, Oregon.
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April 29, 2015
This book should be renamed: Morons Who Make Terrible Decisions.
...
A cookie, Avis told her children, is a soul.
Oh, please! *rolls eyes* Spare me this kind of pseudo-philosophical garbage. The above is the opening sentence of the novel. As soon as I read it I heaved a big sigh. I could tell what kind of book this was going to be.
We've got a family of four: Avis, Brian and their two children Stanley and Felice. Stanley is mainly ignored throughout the novel, getting only one P.O.V. chapter near the end. Otherwise, the chapters flip between the other three.
BRIAN:
This, ladies and gentlemen, is the biggest moron I have ever read about. Seriously stupid. He did the following things in the novel:
- Made cow eyes at a co-worker named Fernanda who is obviously manipulating him. He makes up little fantasies (not icky) about her and wants to "protect" and "save" her from her (what he sees as crappy) life. He idly wonders about what it would be like to make a life with her and he toys with the idea of having an affair with her. He is completely oblivious to the fact that she is manipulating him. Even when other well meaning co-workers warn her about him, he writes them off as "jealous." Total idiot. He is married to a beautiful woman who still loves him and is sexually attracted to him. That doesn't matter! He's completely willing to risk his marriage and throw away everything in life on a whim!
- Is perfectly willing and ready to empty all his accounts and liquidate his assets in order to give 2.3 million dollars to people who are promising big returns on real estate. Can you say "scam?" And of course he never mentions anything to his wife, because why worry her? Won't she be thrilled when he earns a billion dollars from this investment?!?! I cannot believe how stupid he is. He worked hard all his life to earn his money and his upper-class life and he's falling for a completely obvious scam. Because he's a moron.
- He drives into the very poor part of the city - in the middle of the night - in his shiny, new, white SUV in order to look at a building his firm owns. Then he is shocked when he is approached by some dangerous-looking dudes. Still, he is not afraid. Because he's too stupid to be afraid. He wants to help them! They must be poor and just would be really grateful if a rich white man drove into their neighborhood and started lecturing them about getting a job and education! (I am not lying, he really does this.) He will give him his SUV! Wow! What a generous guy he is! Everyone will love him and be so goshdarn grateful! Now take note: they do not ASK for his SUV or try to rob him in any way - he volunteers to give them his SUV because he is a bleeding heart. And stupid. I really thought he might be going insane at this point - but no, he's just an idiot.
- He drives IN A HURRICANE to his office. Why? To work? Hahaha, no. Because he thinks his best friend Javier will gossip to his crush Fernanda behind his back if he doesn't show up. Guess what? It's a hurricane! Maybe you should stay home with your family and be safe. Guess what? Probably your friend and Fernanda ALSO have decided to stay home and be safe instead of coming into work which is probably shut down anyway! Does this ever occur to idiot Brian?!!? No! Because he's a moron.
- He is a hypochondriac and is constantly imagining symptoms that foretell his imminent death.
- He is paranoid because he works with a bunch of Cuban-Americans and he thinks that every time they speak Spanish to each other that they are mocking him. And making secret, lucrative deals without him that he has no chance of making because he is not a Spanish-speaker.
In short, I didn't like him. I mean, he wasn't a sexual predator (rapist, child molester, pervert, skeezeball) so it could have been worse. But, gosh, I hated him. Weak-ass, dumbass, pathetic, very unattractive personality - I couldn't stand him! And did you notice that he suffers NO consequences from any of his dumb decisions!?!? Inconceivable!
...
AVIS:
I didn't like her either. When her daughter Felice runs away, at age 13, Avis's life breaks apart. She never really recovers from it. She sees her daughter 8 times between the ages of 13 and 18, in meetings arranged by Felice in which they have lunch and she gives Felice cash. Brian refuses to see Felice after she becomes a runaway because, as he puts it, "We don't negotiate with terrorists."
Before Felice runs away, I think Avis was a bad parent. Why, Carmen? She didn't beat her kids or verbally abuse them. She didn't neglect them. She loved them. Yes, that's true. But there's more than one way to screw up a family.
THE WAY SHE TREATS FELICE. She is worshipful of her daughter's beauty. She is constantly commenting on how beautiful and thin Felice is. She admires Felice when Felice doesn't eat or doesn't show much interest in food. Felice is 12, okay!? 12. Twelve and under when all this shit is going on.
Avis remembers toiling over the delicate ginger coins for Felice's 10th birthday, only for her daughter to thank her politely and then refuse to eat them. She'd said, "I just like the way they look."
Avis had felt singed by the rejection. Yet there was also a pang of admiration: the purity of Felice's desires - preferring beauty to sugar!
Felice is stared at by strangers wherever they go. Avis tells them that they just don't know how to deal with beauty. Avis takes Felice to tea and they spend hours talking about passerbys' clothes and whether they would look good on Felice or not.
Well, Avis, this is a great way to make sure your daughter develops an eating disorder. Way to go! There is more than one way to kindle an eating disorder in your child, but this is definitely one of them. Not to mention that even though it is never mentioned or directly referred to in any way, Avis has her own problems with food. She is a baker and creates cookies, cakes, and treats all day. She is very thin and bony, and she barely eats.
She places her hands square on her knees - they feel knobby; the bones in her back feel sharp as piano keys.
The book is constantly (CONSTANTLY) reminding us how thin and tiny both Avis and Felice are. As if that is the only thing that matters or gives you worth as a woman. It is vaguely hinted at that being very thin is a kind of revenge Avis is taking on her mother for saying that Avis would become fat if she got a career as a baker. That's Eating Disorder 101, right there. And Avis's mother is strongly portrayed as being anorexic - even though it is never called this or directly addressed.
Both Avis and Felice barely eat, but the author makes this seem like no big deal, claims that both of them are healthy, and never mentions or hints at the fact that they both have food issues - even though it was screaming out at me from every page. ED is like a very, very faint subtext woven through this whole book but never looked at, addressed, or even acknowledged. I wonder why? Seriously, I don't know why.
THE WAY SHE TREATS STANLEY:
Avis has some bogus idea in her mind that
For years and years, that's how it was - even her son knew it - that somehow, without any conscious decision, Avis had assumed that daughters belonged to mothers, and sons to fathers. Before she'd ever had kids or even met her husband, she'd imagined baking with a daughter.
When her son turns out to be great at baking, and very watchful and worshipful and eager of her in the kitchen, she shuts that shit down. BECAUSE HE'S A BOY. As a result of his mother very cruelly pissing on all of his dreams, not acknowledging his talent, and encouraging him to become a lawyer - when clearly he is MEANT to bake and cook - he becomes rather cold and distant as an adult. And Avis has the gall to wonder why? Terrible parenting. Terrible. All that natural talent down the drain because his mom was a sexist pig. Her daughter Felice had no interest in baking or cooking, so it wasn't like she was even being realistic in her mother-daughter fantasies.
When Felice was living with them (up to age 13), she is Avis's obvious favorite and the center of her attention. When Felice runs away and almost completely disappears from the family's life, Stanley is STILL ignored as all his parents' time and energy goes into searching for and worrying about the missing Felice.
ANOTHER THING ABOUT AVIS:
She thinks the way she views the world MUST be the way everyone views the world, and that her feelings and motivations must be the same feelings and motivations of everyone. It's very narrow-minded and self-centered.
ETA: When Stanley and Nieves come to her and tell her
...
FELICE:
Okay, lastly, Felice herself. Even though she is pretty stupid at times (must take after her parents), she was the only character in the book I could really sympathize with. I mean, it's natural for children and teenagers to do dumb things and make mistakes. She had an excuse! And her reasons for running away and living on the streets really made my heart ache. I understood why she did it and her reasoning and sympathized. Even though what she did in the book wasn't always right, or smart - I connected with her in a way I didn't with Brian and Avis.
She is obsessed with her own beauty and appearance (not surprising with that mother of hers). It's sad when a young girl feels like this is the only thing she is valued for. Really sad. Some people might read her as very stuck-up or self-centered (she comes off that way quite often), but I felt pity for her.
...
Abu-Jaber has a nice vocabulary that she uses to great effect. She also is good at turning a phrase. The writing is lovely. The characters are very layered and complex - the book is a wonderful collection of character studies. I am just scratching the surface in this review.
...
This book deals with murder, suicide, sexual assault, child molestation, and teens (even as young as 13) being sexually active (with adults and/or other teens). Just a warning. I didn't feel it was too graphic or explicit in handling this stuff, and I'm pretty sensitive - but it IS there. Not to mention the very subtle, almost unintentional eating disorder thread throughout the book.
...
I'm not sure whether the message of this book is "never have children" or "make sure to have 3 or more children," or what. I'm unclear on Abu-Jaber's whole reason for writing this and what feeling or idea she was going for here. The book isn't happy, but it's not sad and depressing, either. She's not tear-jerking or being emotionally manipulative. I wasn't left with anything, really. I was just like: "Okay. Well, I read that book." I didn't really learn anything or have any new ideas or revelations about anything. I certainly didn't become attached to the characters - the most I could say was that I understood and felt sympathy for Felice. The book wasn't overly violent or going for shock value - despite some of its content. It wasn't plot-driven. It was just a book. I've got nothing. Beautifully written, but without any real point or impact.
APRIL 9th, 2015 EDIT: Well, I was thinking about Cain as I was driving in my car today. And I was thinking that perhaps this book is partly an allegory for Cain's biblical story? Felice is punished for not being her sister's keeper. She is driven out, exiled. But she is never harmed, because God has put a mark upon her.
Is this too much of a stretch? It probably is too much of a stretch. I'm reading too deeply into this.
...
A cookie, Avis told her children, is a soul.
Oh, please! *rolls eyes* Spare me this kind of pseudo-philosophical garbage. The above is the opening sentence of the novel. As soon as I read it I heaved a big sigh. I could tell what kind of book this was going to be.
We've got a family of four: Avis, Brian and their two children Stanley and Felice. Stanley is mainly ignored throughout the novel, getting only one P.O.V. chapter near the end. Otherwise, the chapters flip between the other three.
BRIAN:
This, ladies and gentlemen, is the biggest moron I have ever read about. Seriously stupid. He did the following things in the novel:
- Made cow eyes at a co-worker named Fernanda who is obviously manipulating him. He makes up little fantasies (not icky) about her and wants to "protect" and "save" her from her (what he sees as crappy) life. He idly wonders about what it would be like to make a life with her and he toys with the idea of having an affair with her. He is completely oblivious to the fact that she is manipulating him. Even when other well meaning co-workers warn her about him, he writes them off as "jealous." Total idiot. He is married to a beautiful woman who still loves him and is sexually attracted to him. That doesn't matter! He's completely willing to risk his marriage and throw away everything in life on a whim!
- Is perfectly willing and ready to empty all his accounts and liquidate his assets in order to give 2.3 million dollars to people who are promising big returns on real estate. Can you say "scam?" And of course he never mentions anything to his wife, because why worry her? Won't she be thrilled when he earns a billion dollars from this investment?!?! I cannot believe how stupid he is. He worked hard all his life to earn his money and his upper-class life and he's falling for a completely obvious scam. Because he's a moron.
- He drives into the very poor part of the city - in the middle of the night - in his shiny, new, white SUV in order to look at a building his firm owns. Then he is shocked when he is approached by some dangerous-looking dudes. Still, he is not afraid. Because he's too stupid to be afraid. He wants to help them! They must be poor and just would be really grateful if a rich white man drove into their neighborhood and started lecturing them about getting a job and education! (I am not lying, he really does this.) He will give him his SUV! Wow! What a generous guy he is! Everyone will love him and be so goshdarn grateful! Now take note: they do not ASK for his SUV or try to rob him in any way - he volunteers to give them his SUV because he is a bleeding heart. And stupid. I really thought he might be going insane at this point - but no, he's just an idiot.
- He drives IN A HURRICANE to his office. Why? To work? Hahaha, no. Because he thinks his best friend Javier will gossip to his crush Fernanda behind his back if he doesn't show up. Guess what? It's a hurricane! Maybe you should stay home with your family and be safe. Guess what? Probably your friend and Fernanda ALSO have decided to stay home and be safe instead of coming into work which is probably shut down anyway! Does this ever occur to idiot Brian?!!? No! Because he's a moron.
- He is a hypochondriac and is constantly imagining symptoms that foretell his imminent death.
- He is paranoid because he works with a bunch of Cuban-Americans and he thinks that every time they speak Spanish to each other that they are mocking him. And making secret, lucrative deals without him that he has no chance of making because he is not a Spanish-speaker.
In short, I didn't like him. I mean, he wasn't a sexual predator (rapist, child molester, pervert, skeezeball) so it could have been worse. But, gosh, I hated him. Weak-ass, dumbass, pathetic, very unattractive personality - I couldn't stand him! And did you notice that he suffers NO consequences from any of his dumb decisions!?!? Inconceivable!
...
AVIS:
I didn't like her either. When her daughter Felice runs away, at age 13, Avis's life breaks apart. She never really recovers from it. She sees her daughter 8 times between the ages of 13 and 18, in meetings arranged by Felice in which they have lunch and she gives Felice cash. Brian refuses to see Felice after she becomes a runaway because, as he puts it, "We don't negotiate with terrorists."
Before Felice runs away, I think Avis was a bad parent. Why, Carmen? She didn't beat her kids or verbally abuse them. She didn't neglect them. She loved them. Yes, that's true. But there's more than one way to screw up a family.
THE WAY SHE TREATS FELICE. She is worshipful of her daughter's beauty. She is constantly commenting on how beautiful and thin Felice is. She admires Felice when Felice doesn't eat or doesn't show much interest in food. Felice is 12, okay!? 12. Twelve and under when all this shit is going on.
Avis remembers toiling over the delicate ginger coins for Felice's 10th birthday, only for her daughter to thank her politely and then refuse to eat them. She'd said, "I just like the way they look."
Avis had felt singed by the rejection. Yet there was also a pang of admiration: the purity of Felice's desires - preferring beauty to sugar!
Felice is stared at by strangers wherever they go. Avis tells them that they just don't know how to deal with beauty. Avis takes Felice to tea and they spend hours talking about passerbys' clothes and whether they would look good on Felice or not.
Well, Avis, this is a great way to make sure your daughter develops an eating disorder. Way to go! There is more than one way to kindle an eating disorder in your child, but this is definitely one of them. Not to mention that even though it is never mentioned or directly referred to in any way, Avis has her own problems with food. She is a baker and creates cookies, cakes, and treats all day. She is very thin and bony, and she barely eats.
She places her hands square on her knees - they feel knobby; the bones in her back feel sharp as piano keys.
The book is constantly (CONSTANTLY) reminding us how thin and tiny both Avis and Felice are. As if that is the only thing that matters or gives you worth as a woman. It is vaguely hinted at that being very thin is a kind of revenge Avis is taking on her mother for saying that Avis would become fat if she got a career as a baker. That's Eating Disorder 101, right there. And Avis's mother is strongly portrayed as being anorexic - even though it is never called this or directly addressed.
Both Avis and Felice barely eat, but the author makes this seem like no big deal, claims that both of them are healthy, and never mentions or hints at the fact that they both have food issues - even though it was screaming out at me from every page. ED is like a very, very faint subtext woven through this whole book but never looked at, addressed, or even acknowledged. I wonder why? Seriously, I don't know why.
THE WAY SHE TREATS STANLEY:
Avis has some bogus idea in her mind that
For years and years, that's how it was - even her son knew it - that somehow, without any conscious decision, Avis had assumed that daughters belonged to mothers, and sons to fathers. Before she'd ever had kids or even met her husband, she'd imagined baking with a daughter.
When her son turns out to be great at baking, and very watchful and worshipful and eager of her in the kitchen, she shuts that shit down. BECAUSE HE'S A BOY. As a result of his mother very cruelly pissing on all of his dreams, not acknowledging his talent, and encouraging him to become a lawyer - when clearly he is MEANT to bake and cook - he becomes rather cold and distant as an adult. And Avis has the gall to wonder why? Terrible parenting. Terrible. All that natural talent down the drain because his mom was a sexist pig. Her daughter Felice had no interest in baking or cooking, so it wasn't like she was even being realistic in her mother-daughter fantasies.
When Felice was living with them (up to age 13), she is Avis's obvious favorite and the center of her attention. When Felice runs away and almost completely disappears from the family's life, Stanley is STILL ignored as all his parents' time and energy goes into searching for and worrying about the missing Felice.
ANOTHER THING ABOUT AVIS:
She thinks the way she views the world MUST be the way everyone views the world, and that her feelings and motivations must be the same feelings and motivations of everyone. It's very narrow-minded and self-centered.
ETA: When Stanley and Nieves come to her and tell her
...
FELICE:
Okay, lastly, Felice herself. Even though she is pretty stupid at times (must take after her parents), she was the only character in the book I could really sympathize with. I mean, it's natural for children and teenagers to do dumb things and make mistakes. She had an excuse! And her reasons for running away and living on the streets really made my heart ache. I understood why she did it and her reasoning and sympathized. Even though what she did in the book wasn't always right, or smart - I connected with her in a way I didn't with Brian and Avis.
She is obsessed with her own beauty and appearance (not surprising with that mother of hers). It's sad when a young girl feels like this is the only thing she is valued for. Really sad. Some people might read her as very stuck-up or self-centered (she comes off that way quite often), but I felt pity for her.
...
Abu-Jaber has a nice vocabulary that she uses to great effect. She also is good at turning a phrase. The writing is lovely. The characters are very layered and complex - the book is a wonderful collection of character studies. I am just scratching the surface in this review.
...
This book deals with murder, suicide, sexual assault, child molestation, and teens (even as young as 13) being sexually active (with adults and/or other teens). Just a warning. I didn't feel it was too graphic or explicit in handling this stuff, and I'm pretty sensitive - but it IS there. Not to mention the very subtle, almost unintentional eating disorder thread throughout the book.
...
I'm not sure whether the message of this book is "never have children" or "make sure to have 3 or more children," or what. I'm unclear on Abu-Jaber's whole reason for writing this and what feeling or idea she was going for here. The book isn't happy, but it's not sad and depressing, either. She's not tear-jerking or being emotionally manipulative. I wasn't left with anything, really. I was just like: "Okay. Well, I read that book." I didn't really learn anything or have any new ideas or revelations about anything. I certainly didn't become attached to the characters - the most I could say was that I understood and felt sympathy for Felice. The book wasn't overly violent or going for shock value - despite some of its content. It wasn't plot-driven. It was just a book. I've got nothing. Beautifully written, but without any real point or impact.
APRIL 9th, 2015 EDIT: Well, I was thinking about Cain as I was driving in my car today. And I was thinking that perhaps this book is partly an allegory for Cain's biblical story? Felice is punished for not being her sister's keeper. She is driven out, exiled. But she is never harmed, because God has put a mark upon her.
Is this too much of a stretch? It probably is too much of a stretch. I'm reading too deeply into this.
July 20, 2014
Diana Abu-Jaber's writing hits all of the marks for high praise in this book about a family coping with the loss of their teenage daughter, a junior high school runaway reaching her 18th birthday and living on the streets by choice instead of opting to stay comfortable in her Floridian upper middle class life.
There are lush foodie descriptions, of the cakes and pastries baked by the girl's wealthy mother and equally, of the organic foods sold and prepared by the proletarian (also by choice) brother. There are white people trying to reconcile their privilege with "streetwise" blacks and Hispanics everywhere, in bordering on "magical Negro"-storyline sorts of ways. (It's all black people that help the white people reconcile their awkward feelings. One of the black persons is Haitian and casts a spell of sorts for a white character.)
Characters get sexually assaulted. Characters try to act blase about affairs. Characters confront their fears about aging and their angst about what it is to be a good parent. If I were feeling crankier I might put a "zzzz" there, because these are all the hallmarks of Very Serious Literature and many of them are without consequence in Birds of Paradise.
There is nothing technically wrong with this book; it's even very touching in places. And, like I said, immaculately polished. But there is also a noticeable lack of levity. Tensions build, people make ill-advised decisions, people go missing and get hurt. And then, to hammer the point home, the climax is a literal storm: Florida's chunk of Hurricane Katrina. Not as devastating as it was to New Orleans but enough to shake up the world of the book.
This kind of sober, relentless, onward march of pain & misery makes the book read all dirge-like. It's exactly the kind of lit that gets those blurbs with a million synonyms for "gorgeous prose" from other writers, but that few non-professional readers actually want to read. Given the choice between a grilled cheese sandwich and a "tahini, African honey, and organic banana sandwich on whole wheat bread," I'm sorry, but I'm probably going to take the grilled cheese every time. The grilled cheese sounds a lot more fun.
There are lush foodie descriptions, of the cakes and pastries baked by the girl's wealthy mother and equally, of the organic foods sold and prepared by the proletarian (also by choice) brother. There are white people trying to reconcile their privilege with "streetwise" blacks and Hispanics everywhere, in bordering on "magical Negro"-storyline sorts of ways. (It's all black people that help the white people reconcile their awkward feelings. One of the black persons is Haitian and casts a spell of sorts for a white character.)
Characters get sexually assaulted. Characters try to act blase about affairs. Characters confront their fears about aging and their angst about what it is to be a good parent. If I were feeling crankier I might put a "zzzz" there, because these are all the hallmarks of Very Serious Literature and many of them are without consequence in Birds of Paradise.
There is nothing technically wrong with this book; it's even very touching in places. And, like I said, immaculately polished. But there is also a noticeable lack of levity. Tensions build, people make ill-advised decisions, people go missing and get hurt. And then, to hammer the point home, the climax is a literal storm: Florida's chunk of Hurricane Katrina. Not as devastating as it was to New Orleans but enough to shake up the world of the book.
This kind of sober, relentless, onward march of pain & misery makes the book read all dirge-like. It's exactly the kind of lit that gets those blurbs with a million synonyms for "gorgeous prose" from other writers, but that few non-professional readers actually want to read. Given the choice between a grilled cheese sandwich and a "tahini, African honey, and organic banana sandwich on whole wheat bread," I'm sorry, but I'm probably going to take the grilled cheese every time. The grilled cheese sounds a lot more fun.
October 17, 2011
I was left with an overwhelming feeling of sadness and heaviness, despite the author's attempt at leaving this book on an uplifting note.
I personally read as a form of escapism. My book club elected to read this book, though, so I dug in eagerly, hoping to discover a gem I would learn to love. Although I connected with the characters individually and in their interactions with one another, I was left feeling as though all of them were being sheltered, shrouded, and treated as incomplete entities. Perhaps this was deliberate, in order to emphasize their disconnection.
I would actually rate this a 3.5 star, not just a 3. But that isn't an option Goodreads is giving me. And, while the jumping back and forth between memory, the four main characters, and the timeline (sometimes re-living the beginning of a particular time with different characters, therefor feeling as though you're re-creating scenarios) was a little disconcerting, I did enjoy the writing style overall. Had I not been left feeling unfulfilled at the end of the book, I probably would have given 4 stars.
I personally read as a form of escapism. My book club elected to read this book, though, so I dug in eagerly, hoping to discover a gem I would learn to love. Although I connected with the characters individually and in their interactions with one another, I was left feeling as though all of them were being sheltered, shrouded, and treated as incomplete entities. Perhaps this was deliberate, in order to emphasize their disconnection.
I would actually rate this a 3.5 star, not just a 3. But that isn't an option Goodreads is giving me. And, while the jumping back and forth between memory, the four main characters, and the timeline (sometimes re-living the beginning of a particular time with different characters, therefor feeling as though you're re-creating scenarios) was a little disconcerting, I did enjoy the writing style overall. Had I not been left feeling unfulfilled at the end of the book, I probably would have given 4 stars.
August 3, 2012
This book was always going to suffer by comparison since I loved the previous book I read so much, but it was pretty boring. Hard to believe that a book that contains a hurricane, murder and suicide can be boring, but it is. Even the author seemed bored by it, as she abruptly stopped writing. It ended with pretty much no resolution for any of the characters. At one point while I was reading, my cat leaned over and chomped one of the pages. That was the most excitement I got out of it. I guess it's good enough to eat, but not to read.
September 4, 2020
4.5 stars rounded up! Why do I not know this writer??? I am once again in disagreement with my GR friends. This is a book about a family. Well, no. This is a book about MEMBERS of a family. Each member of the family kind of circles his or her own sun, in his or her own orbit, so separately that the family is almost non-existent. These are some really damaged folks. The language is so lovely, and lush. It is so sad and heavy, and yet hopeful, like a flower opening. I just loved it.
November 3, 2011
This is one of the most absorbing novels I've read all year; as in, it made a flight pass quickly, and then later, at home, drew me back to my big comfy office chair for another chapter when I really should have been working.
The story is straightforward. In the days leading up to Hurricane Katrina's landfall in Miami, Avis, an artisan baker, is forced to confront her role in her daughter's disappearance four years ago. The novels POVs rotate between Avis, her attorney husband, and her daughter, who's living on the Miami streets.
With such strong echoes of Carol Shields's Unless (both hinge on a daughter who runs away from a good home in response to a secret tragedy), I worried that no book could upstage Shields's masterpiece. But it manages to settle into its own space, marrying plot and transcendent writing that expands rather than competes with the theme of fraught relationships between successful mothers and daughters maturing into womanhood.
What I find so fascinating--and so authentic--about Diana Abu-Jaber's writing is her ability to bury the story tension almost out of sight beneath her trademark lyrical prose. The result is tension that runs beneath everything, illuminating even the solitary kitchen scenes like a grid of electric wires. I've read all of her novels, and each one takes her writing down further from its airy, almost magical realist beginnings (think the climactic scene of Arabian Jazz: A Novel) to the earthy, almost static pace of real life. Yet each somehow serves to tell an even more compelling story, made more powerful by the confident but subtle connections between big-picture social responsibilities--everything from labor conditions in the Haitian sugarcane industry to urban gentrification and real estate speculation. It reminds me of what I loved so much in Jennifer Egan's Look at Me, another of my favorites.
As a reader, I can't wait for the next novel. As a writer, all I can say is--her students are a lucky bunch.
The story is straightforward. In the days leading up to Hurricane Katrina's landfall in Miami, Avis, an artisan baker, is forced to confront her role in her daughter's disappearance four years ago. The novels POVs rotate between Avis, her attorney husband, and her daughter, who's living on the Miami streets.
With such strong echoes of Carol Shields's Unless (both hinge on a daughter who runs away from a good home in response to a secret tragedy), I worried that no book could upstage Shields's masterpiece. But it manages to settle into its own space, marrying plot and transcendent writing that expands rather than competes with the theme of fraught relationships between successful mothers and daughters maturing into womanhood.
What I find so fascinating--and so authentic--about Diana Abu-Jaber's writing is her ability to bury the story tension almost out of sight beneath her trademark lyrical prose. The result is tension that runs beneath everything, illuminating even the solitary kitchen scenes like a grid of electric wires. I've read all of her novels, and each one takes her writing down further from its airy, almost magical realist beginnings (think the climactic scene of Arabian Jazz: A Novel) to the earthy, almost static pace of real life. Yet each somehow serves to tell an even more compelling story, made more powerful by the confident but subtle connections between big-picture social responsibilities--everything from labor conditions in the Haitian sugarcane industry to urban gentrification and real estate speculation. It reminds me of what I loved so much in Jennifer Egan's Look at Me, another of my favorites.
As a reader, I can't wait for the next novel. As a writer, all I can say is--her students are a lucky bunch.
December 28, 2011
This book made the mistake of trying to do too many things at the same time, and as a result, none of its multiple themes were adequately explored. I think the story was an interesting one, and if the author had really focused on the family dynamics between the four primary characters (Avis, Felice, Stanley, and Brian), I think the book would have been successful. I think the author made several mistakes which detracted from the overal effectiveness of the novel. First, if Felice had run away at an older age, and if there had been a more realistic explanation for her decision to stay on the streets, the book would have made more sense to me. It seemed very implausible that the parents would not have learned the details and significance of the friend's suicide, including how close Hannah was to Felice (clearly the school knew they were "best friends," as evidenced by the scene when Felice was told about the suicide in school), and therefore would have been able to intervene more effectively. It also seemed implausible that the letter written to Hannah would not not have been discovered by her parents, or ultimately exposed by one of the girls involved in the incident.
Secondly, the author seemed determined to include themes about race and class, immigration, the demographics of Miami, hurricanes (why Katrina?), baking, and gentrification. While I understand the importance of creating a realistic setting, the overemphasis on these themes detracted from the exploration of the family relationships.
But my biggest complaint was that the last third of the book was overdramatized, and the dramatic events (the scene on the beach, and the hurricane) were unnecessary. In this story, the drama took place before the book started, and the author easily could have relied on the significance of the 18th birthday to create a compelling story.
Secondly, the author seemed determined to include themes about race and class, immigration, the demographics of Miami, hurricanes (why Katrina?), baking, and gentrification. While I understand the importance of creating a realistic setting, the overemphasis on these themes detracted from the exploration of the family relationships.
But my biggest complaint was that the last third of the book was overdramatized, and the dramatic events (the scene on the beach, and the hurricane) were unnecessary. In this story, the drama took place before the book started, and the author easily could have relied on the significance of the 18th birthday to create a compelling story.
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
March 18, 2014
3.5 really. The way Diana Abu-Jaber writes about food is amazing. The pastry descriptions alone make this book worth reading. Also her characters are complex, and not always likeable, and yet I'm relieved when the bad things they're running toward don't hit them. The pace here is slow, but that's all the better to appreciate her writing.
The first half of the book feels like a mashup of two movies: "Ordinary People" (devastated parents) and "Mostly Martha" (amazing chef). The second half of the book picks up the pace and jams many (maybe too many) social issues into the plot. Reminds me of some Barbara Kingsolver novels. A lot of things seem to be bothering the author--streetkids being used as models, corporate America dominating our food supply, greedy property developers pushing people out of poor neighborhoods. And the Haitians who fled to Miami have stories that nobody is listening to. Fine issues to explore; I'm just not sure they all fit in this story.
In the end, my favorite characters were the more peripheral ones: Stanley (the brother of runaway of Felice), Emerson (the strong man), Nieves (Stanley's girlfriend--wish we'd seen more of her), and Javier (coworker of father Brian, who tends to steal every scene and reminds me of Bobby Cannavale's character in "The Station Agent").
Extremely rich in detail about Miami.
The first half of the book feels like a mashup of two movies: "Ordinary People" (devastated parents) and "Mostly Martha" (amazing chef). The second half of the book picks up the pace and jams many (maybe too many) social issues into the plot. Reminds me of some Barbara Kingsolver novels. A lot of things seem to be bothering the author--streetkids being used as models, corporate America dominating our food supply, greedy property developers pushing people out of poor neighborhoods. And the Haitians who fled to Miami have stories that nobody is listening to. Fine issues to explore; I'm just not sure they all fit in this story.
In the end, my favorite characters were the more peripheral ones: Stanley (the brother of runaway of Felice), Emerson (the strong man), Nieves (Stanley's girlfriend--wish we'd seen more of her), and Javier (coworker of father Brian, who tends to steal every scene and reminds me of Bobby Cannavale's character in "The Station Agent").
Extremely rich in detail about Miami.
January 7, 2012
This is the first book by Diana Abu-Jaber that I've read, but it won't be the last. After reading "Birds of Paradise", I learned that its author won a PEN Center USA Award for Literary Fiction for "Crescent" and an Oregon Book Award for "Arabian Jazz".
"Birds of Paradise" is absolutely heart-rending, literary, and downright lyrical in its portrayal of Felice, her family, the ethnic communities of Miami, FL, the social behavior of emotionally immature teenage girls, the fragility of relationship within the shifting sands of family dynamics, the harsh realities of real estate development, and the alchemy of gourmet pastry creation.
The above topics may, at first glance, appear disparate if not irreconcilable, but in Abu-Jaber's skilled hands, they are merely complementary ingredients in a recipe for what should be another award-winning novel. The book is masterful in its gradual build-up to the revelation of the cause for Felice's departure from her family home and her five-year estrangement from her mother, father, and brother.
There will be no spoilers in this review because this novel demands a lofty place on your "must read" list, and once read, it will leave an indelible mark on your heart.
"Birds of Paradise" is absolutely heart-rending, literary, and downright lyrical in its portrayal of Felice, her family, the ethnic communities of Miami, FL, the social behavior of emotionally immature teenage girls, the fragility of relationship within the shifting sands of family dynamics, the harsh realities of real estate development, and the alchemy of gourmet pastry creation.
The above topics may, at first glance, appear disparate if not irreconcilable, but in Abu-Jaber's skilled hands, they are merely complementary ingredients in a recipe for what should be another award-winning novel. The book is masterful in its gradual build-up to the revelation of the cause for Felice's departure from her family home and her five-year estrangement from her mother, father, and brother.
There will be no spoilers in this review because this novel demands a lofty place on your "must read" list, and once read, it will leave an indelible mark on your heart.
October 17, 2011
It pains me to write this review because Diana Abu-Jabers books have brought me such joy and entertainment in the past. I just did not like this book at all. I honestly think the biggest problem was the editing. It droned on and on about the dads career and business deals that were neither interesting or sexy. There was some very good writing and memorable lines that I even shared with my nonreading husband. "But I did it - I left. To make her happy. You see how that works? You keep leaving, like you say, to keep them happy. You go to work, you keep working, you run away until you're all the way gone. Maybe even you shoot yourself. And the whole time you keep thinking- Are they happy yet?" LOVE THAT LINE!
I am still a fan but just did not love this one.
I am still a fan but just did not love this one.
October 19, 2011
The story Diana Abu-Jaber tells in Birds of Paradise is as multi-leveled as a buttery croissant or honey-drenched baklava. It is the story of one upper middle class family in Miami, fractured when the 13 year old daughter runs away from home and becomes a street kid. The story picks up 5 years after she leaves, as both her 18th birthday and Hurricane Katrina approach the vulnerable coastline and emotionally vulnerable family, each wrapped up in their own distinct world.
The story shifts point of view to each family member, unpeeling the back-story, revealing current day life. As the hurricane and the 18th birthday of runaway Felice approach, each family member is faced with their own individual crisis of spirit and loss. The characters are well-drawn: Avis, a professional baker, creating the most intricate and amazing pastries to accompany her life of longing for her missing daughter; Brian, her lawyer-husband, escaping into the world of high-finance real estate; Stanley, their son, who was overshadowed by Felice's beauty and then by her loss, who found his own passions and fulfillment in the earth and its bounty; and beautiful, broken Felice, who has lived five years on the street, surviving by her looks, carving a small career as a model, trying to atone for a sin she alone knows.
The interweaving of nature's storm and the emotional storm of the family worked well. The descriptions of the baking was amazing. Felice's world was an eye-opener, in that it provided a very different aspect of run-aways than I knew. And I wish Stanley's store was close enough to shop at here. (Brian's world didn't interest me that much, but was also descriptive and edifying.) There is a melancholy pervading the book, but the author does try to bring things together in somewhat of an uplifting manner -- a gentle sunrise after the storm.
This is the third book I have read by this author, and while each hasn't jumped to the top of my all-time favorites list, has been worth the read. Thank you, LibraryThing and the audio-publishers (High Tower) for sending me this book for audio-reading.
The story shifts point of view to each family member, unpeeling the back-story, revealing current day life. As the hurricane and the 18th birthday of runaway Felice approach, each family member is faced with their own individual crisis of spirit and loss. The characters are well-drawn: Avis, a professional baker, creating the most intricate and amazing pastries to accompany her life of longing for her missing daughter; Brian, her lawyer-husband, escaping into the world of high-finance real estate; Stanley, their son, who was overshadowed by Felice's beauty and then by her loss, who found his own passions and fulfillment in the earth and its bounty; and beautiful, broken Felice, who has lived five years on the street, surviving by her looks, carving a small career as a model, trying to atone for a sin she alone knows.
The interweaving of nature's storm and the emotional storm of the family worked well. The descriptions of the baking was amazing. Felice's world was an eye-opener, in that it provided a very different aspect of run-aways than I knew. And I wish Stanley's store was close enough to shop at here. (Brian's world didn't interest me that much, but was also descriptive and edifying.) There is a melancholy pervading the book, but the author does try to bring things together in somewhat of an uplifting manner -- a gentle sunrise after the storm.
This is the third book I have read by this author, and while each hasn't jumped to the top of my all-time favorites list, has been worth the read. Thank you, LibraryThing and the audio-publishers (High Tower) for sending me this book for audio-reading.
November 27, 2011
Replete with beautiful settings and lush desserts, the world in which the Muir family dwells seems wonderfully lovely and filled with all that is good. In fact, they might seem to have it all. But then as we soon learn, life is definitely not perfect for this family. Avis, the mother and baker extraordinaire, manages her home business with all the gusto one might expect from a perfectionist; and the father, Brian, a successful real estate attorney, sustains the family like many a workaholic: from a distance.
And yet there is much to enjoy about the family life. Except for the fact that one day, when she was just thirteen, beautiful daughter Felice ran away for the first time. And over the next five years, she continues to inexplicably disappear.
After the first few times, the family members seemingly go through a kind of disconnect, perhaps in self-protection. Like soldiers living parallel lives while maintaining individual battles, Brian, Avis, and son Stanley nourish their little corners of the universe on separate islands of grief. While out on the streets and the beaches of Miami, Felice struggles to survive and battle against the elements and the dangers.
Meanwhile, a storm called Katrina lurks, threatening to dismantle the world around them. In some ways, the raging storm seems like a metaphor for the wreckage of this family.
But set against this austere backdrop of disarray, Avis’s delectable treats offer a glimpse of beauty, delight, and perhaps hope. The author describes the concoctions down to each delicious detail until we can almost taste them.
What do Avis, Brian, and Stanley share as they struggle against the loss of Felice? And what led Felice to this dramatic and dangerous lifestyle? What will need to happen for her to finally come home?
In some ways, the story felt overly detailed with thoughts, feelings, and history. While I thoroughly enjoyed "Birds of Paradise: A Novel," I’m giving this one four stars.
And yet there is much to enjoy about the family life. Except for the fact that one day, when she was just thirteen, beautiful daughter Felice ran away for the first time. And over the next five years, she continues to inexplicably disappear.
After the first few times, the family members seemingly go through a kind of disconnect, perhaps in self-protection. Like soldiers living parallel lives while maintaining individual battles, Brian, Avis, and son Stanley nourish their little corners of the universe on separate islands of grief. While out on the streets and the beaches of Miami, Felice struggles to survive and battle against the elements and the dangers.
Meanwhile, a storm called Katrina lurks, threatening to dismantle the world around them. In some ways, the raging storm seems like a metaphor for the wreckage of this family.
But set against this austere backdrop of disarray, Avis’s delectable treats offer a glimpse of beauty, delight, and perhaps hope. The author describes the concoctions down to each delicious detail until we can almost taste them.
What do Avis, Brian, and Stanley share as they struggle against the loss of Felice? And what led Felice to this dramatic and dangerous lifestyle? What will need to happen for her to finally come home?
In some ways, the story felt overly detailed with thoughts, feelings, and history. While I thoroughly enjoyed "Birds of Paradise: A Novel," I’m giving this one four stars.
June 15, 2014
Sometimes I want to tell a book, "It's not you, it's me." Take Birds of Paradise, for example. Objectively speaking, I would have to say it's a good book. It's well-written, with a meticulously detailed setting and interesting concepts and situations. It's quite readable, and the author tackles some social issues and ethical questions along the way. But I never warmed up to it.
The novel takes place in sprawling, muggy Miami, and hovers around the lives of members of a quietly unhappy family: mother, Avis, a professional baker known for her intricate concoctions in spun sugar; father, Brian, a lawyer for a development company who struggles to maintain his integrity in a sleezy business; brother Stanley, an idealist who owns a natural foods store; and sister Felice, who ran away from home five years ago and now lives on the streets, for reasons she will not or cannot explain.
Felice's absence is the barely discussed wound at the center of this family. Beyond that, in the world around them, it's clear that most people are silently grappling with disappointment, loss and sorrow, and their glossy exteriors are just for show.
My problem with the novel is that I disliked all the main characters. I'm not sure why, as--apart from Felice--they didn't seem to be bad or unlikable people. With the exception of a couple of secondary characters, such as Avis' Haitian neighbor, Solange (who should have been the main character, but then we'd have a whole different novel), I simply found these people to be rather boring and self-involved.
And then there was Felice. She was not only boring and self-involved, but I hated her for putting her family through so much misery. When the secret was revealed--what she had done that made her feel she had to atone for it by living on the streets--I hated her for that, too.
In sum, Birds of Paradise was a good book that I just didn't like that much. Sometimes that happens.
The novel takes place in sprawling, muggy Miami, and hovers around the lives of members of a quietly unhappy family: mother, Avis, a professional baker known for her intricate concoctions in spun sugar; father, Brian, a lawyer for a development company who struggles to maintain his integrity in a sleezy business; brother Stanley, an idealist who owns a natural foods store; and sister Felice, who ran away from home five years ago and now lives on the streets, for reasons she will not or cannot explain.
Felice's absence is the barely discussed wound at the center of this family. Beyond that, in the world around them, it's clear that most people are silently grappling with disappointment, loss and sorrow, and their glossy exteriors are just for show.
My problem with the novel is that I disliked all the main characters. I'm not sure why, as--apart from Felice--they didn't seem to be bad or unlikable people. With the exception of a couple of secondary characters, such as Avis' Haitian neighbor, Solange (who should have been the main character, but then we'd have a whole different novel), I simply found these people to be rather boring and self-involved.
And then there was Felice. She was not only boring and self-involved, but I hated her for putting her family through so much misery. When the secret was revealed--what she had done that made her feel she had to atone for it by living on the streets--I hated her for that, too.
In sum, Birds of Paradise was a good book that I just didn't like that much. Sometimes that happens.
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September 13, 2011Birds of Paradise, by Diana Abu-Jaber, Narrated by Tamara Marston, Produced by Highbridge Audio, downloaded from audible.com.
This story involves the four members of a family, each chapter is viewed from a different family member’s perspective. Avis Muir is a brilliant pastry chef, Brian Muir a corporate real estate attorney. Their son, Stanley, is the proprietor of a trendy food market. Their
beautiful daughter, Felice, is missing. A runaway at 13, Felice has spent five years modeling tattoos, skateboarding, clubbing, and sleeping in a squat
house or on the beach. She has just turned 18. As the story comes to its climax, everyone around Miami is waiting for a forecasted hurricane. In the end, this hurricane will be the catalyst bringing all of the Muirs together, all of them to face their sense of betrayal, and Felice to come to grips with the terrible guilt she feels regarding her former best friend, which was the reason she left home in the first place. Brian and Avis are coming to grips with changes in their careers and their marriage, Stanley with the possibility that his store will fail and also he now has a pregnant girl friend, and Felice has to come to grips with the hurt she has given herself and her family. A very good book with wonderful sensual descriptions of food, especially of Avis baking food.
This story involves the four members of a family, each chapter is viewed from a different family member’s perspective. Avis Muir is a brilliant pastry chef, Brian Muir a corporate real estate attorney. Their son, Stanley, is the proprietor of a trendy food market. Their
beautiful daughter, Felice, is missing. A runaway at 13, Felice has spent five years modeling tattoos, skateboarding, clubbing, and sleeping in a squat
house or on the beach. She has just turned 18. As the story comes to its climax, everyone around Miami is waiting for a forecasted hurricane. In the end, this hurricane will be the catalyst bringing all of the Muirs together, all of them to face their sense of betrayal, and Felice to come to grips with the terrible guilt she feels regarding her former best friend, which was the reason she left home in the first place. Brian and Avis are coming to grips with changes in their careers and their marriage, Stanley with the possibility that his store will fail and also he now has a pregnant girl friend, and Felice has to come to grips with the hurt she has given herself and her family. A very good book with wonderful sensual descriptions of food, especially of Avis baking food.
October 18, 2011
Birds of Paradise
had me hooked from the start, and took me on a meandering, tense journey that I won't soon forget.
The book tells the story of a family's heartbreak over the seemingly causeless runaway of their 14 year old daughter. Each chapter is told from a different perspective, and gives us insight into how each family member deals with that heartbreak individually, from the mother, father, brother – and the runaway herself.
Through much of the book, I was left wondering what exactly led to the family's current predicament, but as the details begin to slowly take shape, I realized that the 'why' was not nearly as important as the effect it had on this family. I wanted to sit down, shake each one of them, and make them listen to each other.
Diana Abu-Jaber's writing is completely breathtaking. It is books like this that make me want to give up on my own fiction. From grief, to despair, to hopefulness and back again, this is a book that will make you feel.
p.s. It is my duty to inform you that I received a free review copy from the publisher.
The book tells the story of a family's heartbreak over the seemingly causeless runaway of their 14 year old daughter. Each chapter is told from a different perspective, and gives us insight into how each family member deals with that heartbreak individually, from the mother, father, brother – and the runaway herself.
Through much of the book, I was left wondering what exactly led to the family's current predicament, but as the details begin to slowly take shape, I realized that the 'why' was not nearly as important as the effect it had on this family. I wanted to sit down, shake each one of them, and make them listen to each other.
Diana Abu-Jaber's writing is completely breathtaking. It is books like this that make me want to give up on my own fiction. From grief, to despair, to hopefulness and back again, this is a book that will make you feel.
p.s. It is my duty to inform you that I received a free review copy from the publisher.
May 12, 2012
There can be no argument with the language, the writing (not only well-crafted but it wraps you in the novel's rhythms, [dare I say] the torpor of Florida heat?). I have no quibble with the set-up and the unfolding character portraits of a family in disarray, unable to talk to each other. I admire the easy way the politics of food and development are worked in.
My two biggest problems--the reasons I couldn't fully embrace this novel--are:
1) Solange, the Haitian neighbor who knows herbs and, though she's wary and indignant at first, comes to like the creepy white lady and offers comfort. I know, I know. It turns out Solange has bigger problems even than the lady he lost her daughter, but...I didn't buy it.
2) I also didn't buy the kid dialogue, even though it appears she the novelist bought it at a garage sale it was so worn and over-used.
I'd like to go on and talk about some of the subtleties, but...for those who have read her earlier work, you will probably read this. Let me know what you think.
My two biggest problems--the reasons I couldn't fully embrace this novel--are:
1) Solange, the Haitian neighbor who knows herbs and, though she's wary and indignant at first, comes to like the creepy white lady and offers comfort. I know, I know. It turns out Solange has bigger problems even than the lady he lost her daughter, but...I didn't buy it.
2) I also didn't buy the kid dialogue, even though it appears she the novelist bought it at a garage sale it was so worn and over-used.
I'd like to go on and talk about some of the subtleties, but...for those who have read her earlier work, you will probably read this. Let me know what you think.
October 16, 2011
This beautifully layered tale delves into issues of modern family, parenthood, marriage, childhood, lost innocence, redemption. The story of a family living in Miami dealing with the aftermath that follows in the wake of the disappearance of 13-year-old Felice, the extraordinarily beautiful daughter of Avis and Brian, and the sister of Stanley. The story opens six years after Felice's disappearance, on the eve of her 18th birthday, as a hurricane approaches Miami. Through flashbacks and sidesteps, and told from the point of view of Felice, Avis, Brian and finally Stanley as well, we learn what took Felice away from her family and the toll her absence has taken on all of the family members. As the hurricane bears down on the city the driving winds and rain bring about a conclusion that seems so sincere and honest, and yet is heartbreakingly poignant and beautiful. A subtle, quiet novel, but at the same time a compelling page-turner.
March 12, 2013
It was really refreshing to read a book about a runaway who didn't leave home because her parents abused her in any way. For all purposes, Felice really had no reason to leave her home at all. It was all her own choice; she saw it as penance for an act of selfishness and betrayal towards someone who previously meant the world to her.
That being said, I did have a few complaints. My favorite character was Stanley. As Felice's older sibling, I felt that he was the most interestingly affected by her disappearance. I wished we had heard more from his point of view.
I also didn't like that the read doesn't find out Felice's real reason for leaving until well into the tale. The book didn't seem like it was supposed to be a mystery and I didn't like the way that in this particular instance it was treated that way.
However, these are only minor annoyances. Overall, I enjoyed this book much more than I thought I would. Also, it made my teeth hurt every time Avis was in the kitchen.
That being said, I did have a few complaints. My favorite character was Stanley. As Felice's older sibling, I felt that he was the most interestingly affected by her disappearance. I wished we had heard more from his point of view.
I also didn't like that the read doesn't find out Felice's real reason for leaving until well into the tale. The book didn't seem like it was supposed to be a mystery and I didn't like the way that in this particular instance it was treated that way.
However, these are only minor annoyances. Overall, I enjoyed this book much more than I thought I would. Also, it made my teeth hurt every time Avis was in the kitchen.
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
July 25, 2011
A lovely story of a family gently, quietly suffering with a loss, each in their own way. Abu-Jaber's descriptions of food and the culture of Miami make the environment the main characters exist in a critical part of the story. Not knowing much of Miami, I was drawn into the layers of social, economic and environmental chaos that (at some points quite literally) swirled around the family.
March 18, 2016
Fine novel. Diana Abu-Jaber is a good writer. Highly recommend.
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September 16, 2011http://www.washingtonindependentrevie...
Birds of Paradise
Diana Abu-Jaber
W.W. Norton
362 pp.
Reviewed by Martha Toll
Diana Abu-Jaber’s latest novel pivots around a missing teenager whose long absence is a continuing grief for her family. After multiple attempts at running away, Felice Muir finally succeeds when she is thirteen. The novel opens five years later. Although Felice’s parents know she lives near them in Miami, they have had only the barest contact with her over this extended period. In Birds of Paradise, without death’s certainty, the family is in perpetual anguish over possible but ultimately failed connections with Felice.
Abu-Jaber names her characters to underscore irony. Felice, which loosely translates to “happy,” is the Muirs’ angry, vagrant daughter. Her mother is named “Avis,” meaning “bird” in Latin. In contrast to a bird, Avis is stationery — stuck in a morass of self-recrimination and anxiety after her daughter flees the family home. Moreover, Avis is driven to distraction by a pet bird next door, owned by a Haitian immigrant, Solange (variously translated as “solemn,” “peaceful” or “angel”). The title, Birds of Paradise, refers not only to the tropical flower of the same name, but also to the bird symbolism throughout, and the fact that, far from paradise, the Muirs inhabit a private hell. Perhaps with the family’s last name we are meant to conjure John Muir — suggesting the environmental peace and tranquility absent from these pages.
Avis runs an elite pastry business from her home. Her husband, Brian, works as an attorney at a real estate firm of somewhat questionable ethics that aggressively buys land to develop condominiums in Miami’s sprawling suburbs. Although Avis hoped that Felice would inherit her love of baking, it is Stanley, the Muirs’ older child, who embraces food. Stanley serves as the novel’s moral compass. He drops out of college to open a socially conscious market in a low-income neighborhood that not only offers high quality organic meats and produce, but employment for the locals, as well.
As Felice’s 18th birthday approaches, both she and her parents are keenly aware that Felice is about to become an “adult.” But what does “adult” mean in this context? If adult means old enough to fend for oneself, Felice has been an adult for some time. The reader is repeatedly told (to the point of overkill) of Felice’s exquisite beauty. Living on the streets, Felice has learned to use her beauty to make money modeling. However, what she earns is either stolen from her, or squandered on contraband. Felice’s parents have no idea how she supports herself.
As the novel opens, Avis has set up one of her rare meetings with Felice to honor her 18th birthday. She plans to give her daughter money to mark the occasion. Even though it is no surprise, Avis is crushed when Felice fails to materialize.
Felice’s absence has caused such a family rupture that Avis has lost the ability to communicate with her husband. Avis can focus on nothing but her lost daughter. Although Brian knows Felice won’t show for the birthday meeting, Brian and Avis can’t discuss it. Brian fails to offer Avis comfort, and Avis cannot seek it. Brian’s copes by shutting down to avoid reopening the wound from his daughter’s departure. In fact, Felice is never far from either of her parents’ thoughts.
In a format that becomes too predictable, Avis, Felice, and Brian are given successive chapters. We learn something about them in the present tense, while the remainder of each chapter fills in their back story. There is some tension created over Brian’s flirtation with a young co-worker, and his decision to invest all his savings in an extremely risky real estate deal. Further tension is created as we learn more about Felice’s precarious existence in the drug and alcohol saturated world of Miami’s street youth. Gradually, we come to understand that Felice carries a dreadful secret that triggered her departure, although her parents never suspect what it is. Instead, we are privy to Avis’ obsessive, agonized consideration of what she could have done differently as a mother. Eventually, Avis confides in her neighbor Solange, overcoming her desire to call in the authorities to silence Solange’s bird.
In its exploration of a shattered family, Birds of Paradise resonates with Carol Shields’ novel, Unless, and Anne Roiphe’s Loving Kindness. Each of these books delves into a mother’s heartbreaking and irresolvable split from her absent daughter. In Unless, like Birds of Paradise, the divide is over a traumatic event in the daughter’s life. In Loving Kindness, it is religious differences that open the chasm.
This is a difficult subject and Abu-Jaber handles it with fluidity. She uses Avis’ painstaking work over her pastries as a foil for the emotional chaos that threatens to drown her. Authors such as Laura Esquival in Like Water for Chocolate and the mystery writer Diane Mott Davidson may more deftly use food as a fiction motif, but the descriptions of Avis’ baking are fresh and intriguing.
The book’s pace accelerates through Felice’s developing relationship with Emerson, a young man who also finds himself cut loose on Miami’s streets, and through the escalating violence to which Felice and her compatriots subject themselves. Felice’s father, Brian, becomes increasingly reckless himself, leading him into a violent situation, as well. Birds of Paradise uncovers Miami’s seamy underside, a distant cry from the glitzy resort that lures thousands of tourists each year. Abu-Jaber’s beach is never a warm and relaxing destination for weary travelers. At best it is a haven for runaway youth, at worst it is a zone of threats and danger.
Not until the conclusion is Stanley given his own chapter, which adds heft to his role in the family drama. We visit with him at his market as he and his girlfriend board up the building in anticipation of Hurricane Katrina. Periodic weather reports predicting a major hurricane add to the book’s sense of menace.
Birds of Paradise might have been more satisfying if Abu-Jaber had tied up all the loose ends. Instead, we learn that Solange harbors secrets, too, but the author never resolves Solange’s disappearance from the neighborhood. There are also unanswered questions about the Muir family, and about Felice’s and Brian’s encounters with violence. These may be intentional allusions to the ambiguity of human relationships. Even the most stable families are messy once you get inside.
Martha Toll is Executive Director of the Butler Family Fund, a nationwide philanthropy focused on ending homelessness and the death penalty. She has been featured as a book commentator on NPR and has just received representation for her debut novel.
Birds of Paradise
Diana Abu-Jaber
W.W. Norton
362 pp.
Reviewed by Martha Toll
Diana Abu-Jaber’s latest novel pivots around a missing teenager whose long absence is a continuing grief for her family. After multiple attempts at running away, Felice Muir finally succeeds when she is thirteen. The novel opens five years later. Although Felice’s parents know she lives near them in Miami, they have had only the barest contact with her over this extended period. In Birds of Paradise, without death’s certainty, the family is in perpetual anguish over possible but ultimately failed connections with Felice.
Abu-Jaber names her characters to underscore irony. Felice, which loosely translates to “happy,” is the Muirs’ angry, vagrant daughter. Her mother is named “Avis,” meaning “bird” in Latin. In contrast to a bird, Avis is stationery — stuck in a morass of self-recrimination and anxiety after her daughter flees the family home. Moreover, Avis is driven to distraction by a pet bird next door, owned by a Haitian immigrant, Solange (variously translated as “solemn,” “peaceful” or “angel”). The title, Birds of Paradise, refers not only to the tropical flower of the same name, but also to the bird symbolism throughout, and the fact that, far from paradise, the Muirs inhabit a private hell. Perhaps with the family’s last name we are meant to conjure John Muir — suggesting the environmental peace and tranquility absent from these pages.
Avis runs an elite pastry business from her home. Her husband, Brian, works as an attorney at a real estate firm of somewhat questionable ethics that aggressively buys land to develop condominiums in Miami’s sprawling suburbs. Although Avis hoped that Felice would inherit her love of baking, it is Stanley, the Muirs’ older child, who embraces food. Stanley serves as the novel’s moral compass. He drops out of college to open a socially conscious market in a low-income neighborhood that not only offers high quality organic meats and produce, but employment for the locals, as well.
As Felice’s 18th birthday approaches, both she and her parents are keenly aware that Felice is about to become an “adult.” But what does “adult” mean in this context? If adult means old enough to fend for oneself, Felice has been an adult for some time. The reader is repeatedly told (to the point of overkill) of Felice’s exquisite beauty. Living on the streets, Felice has learned to use her beauty to make money modeling. However, what she earns is either stolen from her, or squandered on contraband. Felice’s parents have no idea how she supports herself.
As the novel opens, Avis has set up one of her rare meetings with Felice to honor her 18th birthday. She plans to give her daughter money to mark the occasion. Even though it is no surprise, Avis is crushed when Felice fails to materialize.
Felice’s absence has caused such a family rupture that Avis has lost the ability to communicate with her husband. Avis can focus on nothing but her lost daughter. Although Brian knows Felice won’t show for the birthday meeting, Brian and Avis can’t discuss it. Brian fails to offer Avis comfort, and Avis cannot seek it. Brian’s copes by shutting down to avoid reopening the wound from his daughter’s departure. In fact, Felice is never far from either of her parents’ thoughts.
In a format that becomes too predictable, Avis, Felice, and Brian are given successive chapters. We learn something about them in the present tense, while the remainder of each chapter fills in their back story. There is some tension created over Brian’s flirtation with a young co-worker, and his decision to invest all his savings in an extremely risky real estate deal. Further tension is created as we learn more about Felice’s precarious existence in the drug and alcohol saturated world of Miami’s street youth. Gradually, we come to understand that Felice carries a dreadful secret that triggered her departure, although her parents never suspect what it is. Instead, we are privy to Avis’ obsessive, agonized consideration of what she could have done differently as a mother. Eventually, Avis confides in her neighbor Solange, overcoming her desire to call in the authorities to silence Solange’s bird.
In its exploration of a shattered family, Birds of Paradise resonates with Carol Shields’ novel, Unless, and Anne Roiphe’s Loving Kindness. Each of these books delves into a mother’s heartbreaking and irresolvable split from her absent daughter. In Unless, like Birds of Paradise, the divide is over a traumatic event in the daughter’s life. In Loving Kindness, it is religious differences that open the chasm.
This is a difficult subject and Abu-Jaber handles it with fluidity. She uses Avis’ painstaking work over her pastries as a foil for the emotional chaos that threatens to drown her. Authors such as Laura Esquival in Like Water for Chocolate and the mystery writer Diane Mott Davidson may more deftly use food as a fiction motif, but the descriptions of Avis’ baking are fresh and intriguing.
The book’s pace accelerates through Felice’s developing relationship with Emerson, a young man who also finds himself cut loose on Miami’s streets, and through the escalating violence to which Felice and her compatriots subject themselves. Felice’s father, Brian, becomes increasingly reckless himself, leading him into a violent situation, as well. Birds of Paradise uncovers Miami’s seamy underside, a distant cry from the glitzy resort that lures thousands of tourists each year. Abu-Jaber’s beach is never a warm and relaxing destination for weary travelers. At best it is a haven for runaway youth, at worst it is a zone of threats and danger.
Not until the conclusion is Stanley given his own chapter, which adds heft to his role in the family drama. We visit with him at his market as he and his girlfriend board up the building in anticipation of Hurricane Katrina. Periodic weather reports predicting a major hurricane add to the book’s sense of menace.
Birds of Paradise might have been more satisfying if Abu-Jaber had tied up all the loose ends. Instead, we learn that Solange harbors secrets, too, but the author never resolves Solange’s disappearance from the neighborhood. There are also unanswered questions about the Muir family, and about Felice’s and Brian’s encounters with violence. These may be intentional allusions to the ambiguity of human relationships. Even the most stable families are messy once you get inside.
Martha Toll is Executive Director of the Butler Family Fund, a nationwide philanthropy focused on ending homelessness and the death penalty. She has been featured as a book commentator on NPR and has just received representation for her debut novel.
April 28, 2023
I enjoyed this book about a disintegrating family in Miami, Florida. Alternating chapters focus on Avis, the professional baker mother; her husband Brian, a lawyer for a real estate developer; Felice, who ran away from home when she was 13 because of something horrible that happened at school, and who is now turning 18; and Stanley, the older son who lived in the shadows while the parents fretted about Felice, and who now runs an organic market in Homestead. Each member of the family has his/her own struggles and Felice is the fraying thread that threatens to destroy the family.
I thought Diana Abu-Jaber captured Florida perfectly, from Coral Gables to South Beach to the Art and Design district to Coconut Grove and finally Homestead. I got the book to read before we went to Florida last year, and I just now got around to reading it a year later. I could certainly picture all the places featured in the novel. However, I think there are many loose ends that are left unexplained, especially the situation with Felice and her friend Emerson in the end. Though Abu-Jaber captures well, and in great detail, the angst of each family member, I felt she just drifted off at the end. But overall, I was engrossed in the story and found it very well-written.
I thought Diana Abu-Jaber captured Florida perfectly, from Coral Gables to South Beach to the Art and Design district to Coconut Grove and finally Homestead. I got the book to read before we went to Florida last year, and I just now got around to reading it a year later. I could certainly picture all the places featured in the novel. However, I think there are many loose ends that are left unexplained, especially the situation with Felice and her friend Emerson in the end. Though Abu-Jaber captures well, and in great detail, the angst of each family member, I felt she just drifted off at the end. But overall, I was engrossed in the story and found it very well-written.
November 17, 2013
Diana Abu-Jaber’s delicious new novel weighs less than two pounds, but you may gain more than that by reading it. If you know her cream-filled work — especially “Crescent ” and “The Language of Baklava” — you’re already salivating. This Jordanian American author writes about food so enticingly that her books should be published on sheets of phyllo dough. “Birds of Paradise” contains her most mouthwatering writing ever, but it’s no light after-dinner treat. This is a full-course meal, a rich, complex and memorable story that will leave you lingering gratefully at her table.
On the outside, the Muir family looks blessed. Brian is a prosperous Miami real estate lawyer; his wife, Avis, is a high-end pastry chef who can command whatever price she wants for her irresistible creations of sugar, butter and flour.
Beneath that glaze of success, though, Brian and Avis endure the kind of grinding terror that parents dread in their darkest late-night hours. Everyone loves the Muirs’ resourceful son, Stanley, who runs a popular organic grocery store, but most have forgotten their younger child, a strikingly beautiful girl who started running away at 13. Felice has made contact with her mother only eight times in the past five years, a starvation diet of affection that’s left Brian and Avis feeling “scoured-out,” unable even to cry anymore.
The novel opens as Avis is anxiously preparing for one of those rare get-togethers. “They meet only at Felice’s whim,” Abu-Jaber writes, “on Felice’s terms.” Her daughter gives Avis little advance warning and often doesn’t show up, a cruelly casual arrangement that flays Avis and leaves Brian “desiccated by anger.” Caught in a downdraft of “spiraling disappointment,” they constantly fight the temptation to blame each other for the destruction of their once-happy family. Maybe if Brian had been less strict; maybe if Avis had been more loving — a silent cycle of repressed accusation. Like good upper-middle-class people, both husband and wife seek solace in their work rather than each other, a self-reinforcing tendency that’s drained their marriage of intimacy.
“Birds of Paradise” rotates gracefully through these four family members, chapter by chapter, describing their lives with extraordinary sympathy and a remarkable command of their very different occupations. The respected head of his firm’s legal department, Brian once felt he had come to Miami to help build a great city, but now he realizes that he’s somehow become an advocate for everything his idealistic son opposes: the demolition and redevelopment of old neighborhoods, the destruction of cultural history, the sprawl of bland opulence. It’s 2005 in the months before Hurricane Katrina strikes, and the Florida real estate industry is gorging on borrowed money, “an act of both rebellion and willful perversity — like rebuilding a house on the train tracks.” But Brian is a good man, struggling to ignore his despair and follow his moral compass at a time when everyone around him is behaving like a fool or a crook.
Not surprisingly, the novel’s richest, most aromatic passages detail Avis’s work in the kitchen, where each of her pastries is “as delicately constructed as a piece of stained glass.” Desperate to palliate the heavy sense of guilt she feels for letting their daughter slip away, Avis throws herself into ever more gorgeous and ephemeral desserts. “She knew how to blow sugar into glassine nests and birds and fountains,” Abu-Jaber writes in prose spun just as lushly, “how to construct seven-tiered wedding cakes draped with sugar curtains copied from the tapestries at Versailles.”
In the well-stocked cabinet of this novel’s themes, all that sugar becomes an increasingly important ingredient. How much can hard work sweeten a life poisoned by a lost child? And how innocent, really, are Avis’s delectable pastries, her “evanescence of sugar and butter”? Her all-organic son regards his mother’s creations as an elite pollution of the food chain — environmentally and medically destructive.
Meanwhile, Avis’s new neighbor (the only artificial character in this novel) is an oracular Haitian woman who reminds her of the complicated role that sugar played in Haiti’s bloody history. But Avis can’t abandon the naive hope that she might please her daughter again, if only for a moment, with one of her sweet specialties: “tiny mosaic disks of chocolate flake and candied ginger.”
Abu-Jaber ran away from her father when she was 15, and she brings to Felice’s chapters a kind of visceral sympathy that’s wholly engrossing. Felice lives only a few miles away from her parents — in a flophouse near the beach — but she might as well be on another planet. Her world of runaways and drug addicts, prostitutes and beach bums vibrates with eroticism and menace. Tan, heroine-thin and startlingly gorgeous, Felice can make hundreds of dollars modeling or just sitting in a chic restaurant whenever she wants, but she doesn’t want much out of her dangerous life. With exquisite patience and psychological precision, Abu-Jaber unravels the mystery of the young woman’s decision to run from her home, destroy her parents’ happiness and remain constantly at risk.
In the wide grasp of this story, the author has captured a dynamic city defined by booms and busts and racial conflicts in a stew of different cultures. But with its searching portrayal of a single family in silent crisis, “Birds of Paradise” explores every parent’s unspoken fear: our children’s capacity to destroy us on a whim.
Fortunately, Abu-Jaber is no cynic, and this novel, though far more serious than her previous work, remains committed to the possibility of reconciliation in a way that sounds entirely believable. What seems at first like such a thoughtless act of self-destruction on Felice’s part turns out to be a desperate grasp for atonement. And you don’t want to miss it.
http://articles.washingtonpost.com/20...
On the outside, the Muir family looks blessed. Brian is a prosperous Miami real estate lawyer; his wife, Avis, is a high-end pastry chef who can command whatever price she wants for her irresistible creations of sugar, butter and flour.
Beneath that glaze of success, though, Brian and Avis endure the kind of grinding terror that parents dread in their darkest late-night hours. Everyone loves the Muirs’ resourceful son, Stanley, who runs a popular organic grocery store, but most have forgotten their younger child, a strikingly beautiful girl who started running away at 13. Felice has made contact with her mother only eight times in the past five years, a starvation diet of affection that’s left Brian and Avis feeling “scoured-out,” unable even to cry anymore.
The novel opens as Avis is anxiously preparing for one of those rare get-togethers. “They meet only at Felice’s whim,” Abu-Jaber writes, “on Felice’s terms.” Her daughter gives Avis little advance warning and often doesn’t show up, a cruelly casual arrangement that flays Avis and leaves Brian “desiccated by anger.” Caught in a downdraft of “spiraling disappointment,” they constantly fight the temptation to blame each other for the destruction of their once-happy family. Maybe if Brian had been less strict; maybe if Avis had been more loving — a silent cycle of repressed accusation. Like good upper-middle-class people, both husband and wife seek solace in their work rather than each other, a self-reinforcing tendency that’s drained their marriage of intimacy.
“Birds of Paradise” rotates gracefully through these four family members, chapter by chapter, describing their lives with extraordinary sympathy and a remarkable command of their very different occupations. The respected head of his firm’s legal department, Brian once felt he had come to Miami to help build a great city, but now he realizes that he’s somehow become an advocate for everything his idealistic son opposes: the demolition and redevelopment of old neighborhoods, the destruction of cultural history, the sprawl of bland opulence. It’s 2005 in the months before Hurricane Katrina strikes, and the Florida real estate industry is gorging on borrowed money, “an act of both rebellion and willful perversity — like rebuilding a house on the train tracks.” But Brian is a good man, struggling to ignore his despair and follow his moral compass at a time when everyone around him is behaving like a fool or a crook.
Not surprisingly, the novel’s richest, most aromatic passages detail Avis’s work in the kitchen, where each of her pastries is “as delicately constructed as a piece of stained glass.” Desperate to palliate the heavy sense of guilt she feels for letting their daughter slip away, Avis throws herself into ever more gorgeous and ephemeral desserts. “She knew how to blow sugar into glassine nests and birds and fountains,” Abu-Jaber writes in prose spun just as lushly, “how to construct seven-tiered wedding cakes draped with sugar curtains copied from the tapestries at Versailles.”
In the well-stocked cabinet of this novel’s themes, all that sugar becomes an increasingly important ingredient. How much can hard work sweeten a life poisoned by a lost child? And how innocent, really, are Avis’s delectable pastries, her “evanescence of sugar and butter”? Her all-organic son regards his mother’s creations as an elite pollution of the food chain — environmentally and medically destructive.
Meanwhile, Avis’s new neighbor (the only artificial character in this novel) is an oracular Haitian woman who reminds her of the complicated role that sugar played in Haiti’s bloody history. But Avis can’t abandon the naive hope that she might please her daughter again, if only for a moment, with one of her sweet specialties: “tiny mosaic disks of chocolate flake and candied ginger.”
Abu-Jaber ran away from her father when she was 15, and she brings to Felice’s chapters a kind of visceral sympathy that’s wholly engrossing. Felice lives only a few miles away from her parents — in a flophouse near the beach — but she might as well be on another planet. Her world of runaways and drug addicts, prostitutes and beach bums vibrates with eroticism and menace. Tan, heroine-thin and startlingly gorgeous, Felice can make hundreds of dollars modeling or just sitting in a chic restaurant whenever she wants, but she doesn’t want much out of her dangerous life. With exquisite patience and psychological precision, Abu-Jaber unravels the mystery of the young woman’s decision to run from her home, destroy her parents’ happiness and remain constantly at risk.
In the wide grasp of this story, the author has captured a dynamic city defined by booms and busts and racial conflicts in a stew of different cultures. But with its searching portrayal of a single family in silent crisis, “Birds of Paradise” explores every parent’s unspoken fear: our children’s capacity to destroy us on a whim.
Fortunately, Abu-Jaber is no cynic, and this novel, though far more serious than her previous work, remains committed to the possibility of reconciliation in a way that sounds entirely believable. What seems at first like such a thoughtless act of self-destruction on Felice’s part turns out to be a desperate grasp for atonement. And you don’t want to miss it.
http://articles.washingtonpost.com/20...
January 5, 2019
I really enjoyed this book about family relationships and how the characters dealt with bad things. The sense of place was great - made Miami feel real (and probably much better than it is in real life). I did think that the big mysterious tragedy that caused the daughter to run away from home to punish herself was something of a anticlimax - as was the tragedy that caused her to come back to family. But I forgive Abu-Jaber for being less than horrific in those situations, because all of the rest was so compelling.
May 7, 2018
I had a hard time getting through this novel. Most of the characters were unlikeable and I didn’t find the story compelling – it was easy to put down and not pick back up. I did enjoy the descriptions of Miami and of Avis’s baked goods.
March 22, 2017
A girl runs away from her family when she is thirteen as a self-inflicted punishment. Her family is devastated.
I liked this book. I think the family was idiotic (if your child is running away you take them to a specialist, you take them to a mental hospital, god, something!) but I loved the descriptions of Miami, of the different cultures, even of the mother's baking. I thought the over-descriptions of the the dad's job was so purposeful and gave the reader a good sense of who he was. The brother was maybe a bit much, I get it: corporations are evil and he had such a earnest soul, but he basically opened a Whole Foods... The mother, well, she was so helpless but also not. I liked that not every bit of the book was fast-paced and exciting. I liked that pretty much nothing was sexy or glamorous. The sexy glamorous people were ephemeral, like all beauty. They were so young and I'm a high school teacher, so I know how much kids feel their immortality.
I liked this book. I think the family was idiotic (if your child is running away you take them to a specialist, you take them to a mental hospital, god, something!) but I loved the descriptions of Miami, of the different cultures, even of the mother's baking. I thought the over-descriptions of the the dad's job was so purposeful and gave the reader a good sense of who he was. The brother was maybe a bit much, I get it: corporations are evil and he had such a earnest soul, but he basically opened a Whole Foods... The mother, well, she was so helpless but also not. I liked that not every bit of the book was fast-paced and exciting. I liked that pretty much nothing was sexy or glamorous. The sexy glamorous people were ephemeral, like all beauty. They were so young and I'm a high school teacher, so I know how much kids feel their immortality.
March 29, 2014
Diana Abu-Jaber's novel Birds of Paradise is a gut-wrenching family drama set against the backdrop of the tropical suburbs that surround Miami.
The Muir family is living a seemingly picture-perfect middle-class life. They have a lovely home, great jobs and beautiful children. Look closer and they're a mess.. Each member of the family lives in isolation. They hold in their pain and they fear expressing both their problems and their desires.
The parents, Avis and Brian have long stopped communicating and their marriage is on the brink of collapse. Their adult son, Stanley, has quit college to pursue his dream of owning a community grocery store. He worries that his parents disapprove of choices. The youngest child, Felice, ran away from home in high school and has been living on the streets for years. All four people want to repair their wounds, but a sense of pride and the struggle to communicate keeps forcing them to stay apart, only compounding the situation.
The story is told through all four characters, alternating the focus with each chapter. I found Felice's story to be by far the most compelling. It was kind of like an episode of Dateline with all of the details of the teenagers living on the streets. It was horrible to read, yet I kept wanting more. I felt like the author must have had experience or was very well researched, because the details just rang true. At times, I forgot that I was reading fiction.
Overall, I really enjoyed this novel. Abu-Jaber has a beautiful, lyrical quality to her writing and she really made the city of Miami come alive through her descriptions. In the story, Avis has a baking business and I loved Abu-Jabers flowing paragraphs describing the amazing pastries and cakes. Don't read this story on an empty stomach or while dieting!
My only fault is maybe it tried to accomplish too much. There was a lot going on with all of the characters and it overreached. I was unevenly interested in the various story lines and it led to an uneven pacing. I wish that Felice had been the primary focus of the story, as there was plenty of information with her character to warrant an entire novel. The twist as to why she ran away from home is loaded and could have been explored more deeply. It's a shock.
I look forward to reading more stories by Abu-Jaber. She is a talented storyteller and has a wonderful writer's voice.
Like my review? Check out my blog!
The Muir family is living a seemingly picture-perfect middle-class life. They have a lovely home, great jobs and beautiful children. Look closer and they're a mess.. Each member of the family lives in isolation. They hold in their pain and they fear expressing both their problems and their desires.
The parents, Avis and Brian have long stopped communicating and their marriage is on the brink of collapse. Their adult son, Stanley, has quit college to pursue his dream of owning a community grocery store. He worries that his parents disapprove of choices. The youngest child, Felice, ran away from home in high school and has been living on the streets for years. All four people want to repair their wounds, but a sense of pride and the struggle to communicate keeps forcing them to stay apart, only compounding the situation.
The story is told through all four characters, alternating the focus with each chapter. I found Felice's story to be by far the most compelling. It was kind of like an episode of Dateline with all of the details of the teenagers living on the streets. It was horrible to read, yet I kept wanting more. I felt like the author must have had experience or was very well researched, because the details just rang true. At times, I forgot that I was reading fiction.
Overall, I really enjoyed this novel. Abu-Jaber has a beautiful, lyrical quality to her writing and she really made the city of Miami come alive through her descriptions. In the story, Avis has a baking business and I loved Abu-Jabers flowing paragraphs describing the amazing pastries and cakes. Don't read this story on an empty stomach or while dieting!
My only fault is maybe it tried to accomplish too much. There was a lot going on with all of the characters and it overreached. I was unevenly interested in the various story lines and it led to an uneven pacing. I wish that Felice had been the primary focus of the story, as there was plenty of information with her character to warrant an entire novel. The twist as to why she ran away from home is loaded and could have been explored more deeply. It's a shock.
I look forward to reading more stories by Abu-Jaber. She is a talented storyteller and has a wonderful writer's voice.
Like my review? Check out my blog!
November 11, 2011
Five years after their 13 year-old daughter Felice ran away, Brian and Avis Muir are still struggling to cope with their loss and feelings of failure. Avis is a gourmet pastry chef who immerses herself in her work to deal with her grief, using pastries as comfort and communication. (There are so many lush descriptions of pastries in this book – I was craving baked goods almost the whole time I listened to it!) Brian is a real estate lawyer and he and Avis’s oldest child, Stanley, owns a natural foods grocery store. Felice, who is almost 18 now, lives on the beach and earns money by doing sporadic modeling jobs.
The story alternates between Avis, Brian and Felice’s point of view. The reason that Felice ran away is slowly revealed through flashbacks. Abu-Jaber has a gift for metaphor and writes very lyrically. The main characters are well-developed. Although I didn’t agree with the choices that Avis made, I think there are mothers out there that would have made the same ones. There was one loose end regarding Avis’s neighbor that I wish would have been wrapped up at the end but I thought the rest of the plot lines ended in a good spot.
Felice works as a model, even shooting a Gap ad. I found myself wondering how accurate Abu-Jabar’s representation of the Miami modeling scene was. I dabble in modeling here in Kansas City and there is no way a major client here would hire a homeless kid who didn’t have an agent but maybe things are different in Miami. I was kind of drawn out of the story whenever modeling was brought up because I would start wondering about that.
I listened to the audio version of this book. I liked the narrator – she had a gentle, soothing voice. It was almost too soothing; a few times I was so relaxed that I realized I wasn’t paying attention and had to rewind.
After reading this lovely offering from Diana Abu-Jabar, I’m looking forward to reading more of her books.
The story alternates between Avis, Brian and Felice’s point of view. The reason that Felice ran away is slowly revealed through flashbacks. Abu-Jaber has a gift for metaphor and writes very lyrically. The main characters are well-developed. Although I didn’t agree with the choices that Avis made, I think there are mothers out there that would have made the same ones. There was one loose end regarding Avis’s neighbor that I wish would have been wrapped up at the end but I thought the rest of the plot lines ended in a good spot.
Felice works as a model, even shooting a Gap ad. I found myself wondering how accurate Abu-Jabar’s representation of the Miami modeling scene was. I dabble in modeling here in Kansas City and there is no way a major client here would hire a homeless kid who didn’t have an agent but maybe things are different in Miami. I was kind of drawn out of the story whenever modeling was brought up because I would start wondering about that.
I listened to the audio version of this book. I liked the narrator – she had a gentle, soothing voice. It was almost too soothing; a few times I was so relaxed that I realized I wasn’t paying attention and had to rewind.
After reading this lovely offering from Diana Abu-Jabar, I’m looking forward to reading more of her books.
July 2, 2013
I am consistently amazed by how versatile Diana Abu Jaber is. I was drawn in by the book Crescent and then devoured The Language of Baklava and Arabian Jazz, all of which centered on Arab-American blended families and the challenges and discriminations they face. These were delicacies to be sure, sweet, sad fulfilling, but then came Origin and blew me out of the water. Origin was the story of an orphan searching for a past she barely remembered. The barely remembered past defined her to herself as a freak, but the truth about her past was so much more horrible, you wonder if it would have been better for her to have stuck to her far fetched fairy tale.
Birds of Paradise is completely different than all of these. Like some of her novels there are no blacks or whites but only shades of gray, where almost no one is ever as bad as they appear. However, I did not like the husband at all and felt like he was a complete insensitive moron. He may or may not redeem himself by the end of the book but he's still a moron to the point that I don't know how he had such astute children.
The children are what really make this book and I would say she captures a great deal of Jodi Picoult's ability to illustrate real life adolescents without falling for any particular stereotype. This is the story of Felice, a runaway who comes across as sociopathic until you find out the truth of what drove her from her home. It is also the story of her brother Stanley whom neither parent appears to love or even pay attention to in all the drama surrounding Felice, but who manages to flourish on his own. There are also Solange and Emerson who are saviors in disguise.
Every Diana Abu Jaber book is a must read, and I cannot tell you why I love this one more than the others except that maybe I have met Felice many times over in my life only I could not save her.
Birds of Paradise is completely different than all of these. Like some of her novels there are no blacks or whites but only shades of gray, where almost no one is ever as bad as they appear. However, I did not like the husband at all and felt like he was a complete insensitive moron. He may or may not redeem himself by the end of the book but he's still a moron to the point that I don't know how he had such astute children.
The children are what really make this book and I would say she captures a great deal of Jodi Picoult's ability to illustrate real life adolescents without falling for any particular stereotype. This is the story of Felice, a runaway who comes across as sociopathic until you find out the truth of what drove her from her home. It is also the story of her brother Stanley whom neither parent appears to love or even pay attention to in all the drama surrounding Felice, but who manages to flourish on his own. There are also Solange and Emerson who are saviors in disguise.
Every Diana Abu Jaber book is a must read, and I cannot tell you why I love this one more than the others except that maybe I have met Felice many times over in my life only I could not save her.
October 30, 2011
I was privileged to receive this audio book from Library Thing and found the book to be enjoyable. For some reason the voice of the narrator was difficult for me to connect with but the story line held my attention and I was hopeful for the positive reunion and redemption of the characters from the beginning.
The setting is Florida and the book is told in chapters with a different family member the center of each chapter. Felice is the thirteen year old runaway who is the main character in the story. Her mother Avis, is a baker who is fixated on the beauty and fascination of her own pastry creations, which also raises the health concern of refined sugar in ones diet. The issue of food illnesses such as bulimia in the teen years is connected to Felice as some of her friends suffering from this disease. This creates even more separation with her own family at this impressionable time her life since her mother’s life revolves around baking and creating her pastry offerings. It seems as if Avis knows no other way to show her love and dedication to her own family. Depression, dependance, the pains of growing up and establishing ones own identity are all touched on in this family story.
Felice usually reenters her family’s life only as she needs money and connection. She is not dependable and shows up late, or not at all for appointments with her mother and family. Can this distance be bridged and what happens when children strike out and rebel at a very young age? There are many scenarios painted in this novel and some may come close to home for families struggling with a rebellious child in their own family. Birds of Paradise is a well written novel which has may have an impact on those who read it. I will give this book a 4.0 rating.
The setting is Florida and the book is told in chapters with a different family member the center of each chapter. Felice is the thirteen year old runaway who is the main character in the story. Her mother Avis, is a baker who is fixated on the beauty and fascination of her own pastry creations, which also raises the health concern of refined sugar in ones diet. The issue of food illnesses such as bulimia in the teen years is connected to Felice as some of her friends suffering from this disease. This creates even more separation with her own family at this impressionable time her life since her mother’s life revolves around baking and creating her pastry offerings. It seems as if Avis knows no other way to show her love and dedication to her own family. Depression, dependance, the pains of growing up and establishing ones own identity are all touched on in this family story.
Felice usually reenters her family’s life only as she needs money and connection. She is not dependable and shows up late, or not at all for appointments with her mother and family. Can this distance be bridged and what happens when children strike out and rebel at a very young age? There are many scenarios painted in this novel and some may come close to home for families struggling with a rebellious child in their own family. Birds of Paradise is a well written novel which has may have an impact on those who read it. I will give this book a 4.0 rating.
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