Review by Booklist Review
Townsend's second novel, following Saint Monkey (2014), is an intense exploration of gender, race, and class rooted in transnational geopolitics and a tale that challenges readers to recognize the gap between sentimental notions of maternal instincts and the sometimes gritty reality of mothering. In Morocco with her boyfriend after surviving an accident and learning that she won't be able to have children, Shannon illegally acquires a baby girl and takes her back to Louisville, Kentucky. This unintentionally cruel act worsens the already severe trauma of the toddler's birth mother, Souria. Ultimately, the women's stories span the Saharan desert, Mauritania, Morocco, and Louisville, forming a slide show of sharply different lives. The growing girl's coming to terms with her two mothers, Shannon's deepening self-awareness, and Souria's precarious situation in the wake of her harrowing experiences of slavery and sex trafficking are all thoughtfully dramatized and strongly constructed around each compelling character. Townsend's insights into self, motherhood, freedom, and love and her ability to illuminate multiple realities as this complex tale unfolds ensure that this is a gripping and provocative read.
From Booklist, Copyright (c) American Library Association. Used with permission.
Review by Publisher's Weekly Review
The lives of two women from across the globe intersect in this impactful story of motherhood, resilience, and belonging from Townsend (Saint Monkey). Souria, a young Mauritanian woman trafficked from her family as a girl, lands in Marrakech, pregnant and alone, and attempts to carve out an independent life for herself. Shannon, a 28-year-old Black woman living in Kentucky with her parents as she recovers from a car accident, accepts an invitation from her boyfriend, Vladimir, to accompany him on a business trip to Morocco. The couple, desperate to begin a fresh stage of their lives, marry soon after their return. Two years later, and after several attempts at IVF, Shannon and Vladimir return to Morocco, where Shannon finds Souria's two-year-old daughter, apparently abandoned. In a hasty decision, Shannon names the girl Mardi and decides to adopt her. As Mardi grows up and struggles to adjust to her new life, Shannon grapples with the demands of motherhood while Souria mourns the loss of her child. In scenes both vast and intimate, Townsend brings to life the busy streets of Marrakech as well as the quiet suburbs of Kentucky. This moving story about love and loss will not easily be forgotten. (May)
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Review by Library Journal Review
Neglected as a child, Black American Shannon is swamped with debt after college and then sustains injuries in a car accident that result in job loss, chronic pain, and an inability to have children. On a second trip to Morocco with her husband, whom she married more for security than love, she notices a three-year-old girl seemingly alone in the marketplace. Her need to be a mother buries her common sense, and she kidnaps the child, bribes embassy officials to fake the necessary paperwork, and returns to the United States with little Yumna. Renamed Mira, Yumna is actually the cherished daughter of Souria, a Mauritanian woman who has already survived enslavement, trafficking, and abuse and is frantic when she cannot find her daughter. Yet Souria has limited recourse because she is in Morocco illegally. After five years, Shannon finally returns to Morocco to find Mira's mother, with the eventual reunion revealing the stark difference between the two mothers' lives. VERDICT Winner of the Janet Heidinger Kafka and James Fenimore Cooper prizes for Saint Monkey, Townsend provides many perspectives on motherhood while addressing potent issues of kidnapping, slavery, rape, abuse, and neglect, and vividly depicting their consequences. Highly recommended.--Joanna M. Burkhardt
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Review by Kirkus Book Review
This story of a kidnapping in Morocco explores global inequity from the points of view of two mothers. The first half of the novel depicts the experiences of two very different women: Shannon, a Black American trying to keep her marriage together, and Souria, a Mauritanian struggling to survive. Souria is first shown as a teenager who's been captured in the Sahara and taken as a slave by a desert tribe. Resourceful and brave, she eventually escapes to the city of Marrakech, where she tries to build a better life for herself and her 2-year-old daughter, Yu. That is, until Shannon, while vacationing with her engineer boyfriend, comes upon Yu in an alley, assumes the disheveled girl has been abandoned, and brings her back to the U.S. to adopt her. Shannon's own trauma at first blinds her to the harm she is causing. She's a disabled, highly indebted woman who was all but abandoned by her emotionally distant middle-class parents. The pace accelerates in the second half of the book while also introducing a third perspective, that of the adopted daughter, now renamed Mardi. Although the readers see Mardi/Yu struggling to adapt to a new way of life in Louisville, Kentucky, she is never as fully developed a character as the other women. It's also hard to believe that Shannon as depicted would actually kidnap a child. The novel's great strengths are the gorgeous prose and deep empathy that Townsend extends to both Souria and Shannon. Her multifaceted portrait of Morocco and insights into American privilege, transnational colorism, and transgenerational trauma elevate what could have been merely a tragic crime story. This thought-provoking novel highlights the precarious state of Black women and girls. Copyright (c) Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.
Copyright (c) Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.
