I had this book sitting on my shelf for almost a year now and I couldn't get myself to go through with it the first time. While the storytelling is in fact, beautiful, it's not exactly for me. It's beautiful in a simple way, and I guess I've been reading too much poetic prose to be able to appreciate it. The story felt like a drag in the beginning, since the story spanned two generations before Ava. But in the end, I stuck with it and I actually appreciated the way the story was told. There is just something so captivating about it, of how real its world and its characters feel like.
While I appreciate the author's efforts in portraying the emotions of the characters in a very realistic way, as well as portraying love with all its rawness, the ugly parts along with the magical moments, and the agony that inhabits one's heart once they've been through the trauma love inflicts, I would've related to it more 3 years ago. This book is a book of melancholy, of love, of strange things and strange people. This is a book that can make you feel again, if you have forgotten how when apathy had been the only resident of your heart. Or maybe that's just me.
I liked how Ava redeemed herself in the last page, how, after the tragedy that almost took away her will to live, she decided to try one more time, and this time, she soared the skies. For me the horrific scene with Nathaniel Sorrows was kind of like a metaphor that encompassed the whole novel and Ava put an end to the choices and fears of her mother and her grandmother, who, before her, had loved and lost and decided that they would never open their hearts once again, in fear of being hurt and betrayed. Ava, after what she had been through, held on to the hope of what could be and threw caution to the wind quite literally, when she spread her wings, jumped from the widow's walk and flew, embracing who she truly is, a girl, a daughter, a winged creature. In that moment when she saw the truck pull over at the Cooper's house and smiled and allowed herself that moment of joy wash all of her worries away and make herself feel better, she decided to live again and give herself another chance, despite the knowledge of how cruel the world and its inhabitants could be.
She doesn't care. She can fly.