FAMILY LORE

A sprawling novel about the regrets and desires of a family of women.

Acevedo’s widely anticipated new novel, her first for adults, begins with an oblique bit of magic: Flor, who for her whole life has been able to predict when and how people will die, announces that she will be holding a living wake for herself, and all her siblings are invited (and their children, too). Whether Flor has predicted her own death—or anyone else’s—doesn’t become clear to either the reader or Flor’s family until later. In the meantime, we’re introduced to Flor’s sisters, Matilde, Pastora, and Camila; her daughter, Ona; and her niece Yadi, many of whom have magical powers of their own. Chapters alternate among points of view, but unfortunately, Acevedo hasn’t endowed any of these characters—aside from Ona—with a particularly distinctive voice, which means that it can take a bit of effort to remember who’s who. The novel’s pacing sags, too, and despite the anticipation of Flor’s upcoming wake, there isn’t much in the way of forward momentum. In places, Acevedo’s prose seems rushed or slightly tangled. At one point, she writes, “the alarm system that most folk have that trip one into fight or flight was muted in Flor”—an unnecessarily wordy sentence that relies on a mixed metaphor. Even the casual references to magic feel tired, as if Acevedo had borrowed the affectation from other writers but hadn’t imbued it with a flavor all her own. Elsewhere, though, the prose shines: “Maybe that is the original definition of nightmare? A dream that gallops through, dragging the dreamer from one haunting to the next.”

An uneven effort with somewhat flat characters and prose that fails to sing consistently.