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A Room Away from the Wolves by Nova Ren Suma Release Date: September 4th, 2018
Publisher: Algonquin Young Readers
Genre: Young Adult, Magical Realism, Mystery
Goodreads/Amazon
Bina has never forgotten the time she and her mother ran away from home. Her mother promised they would hitchhike to the city to escape Bina’s cruel father and start over. But before they could even leave town, Bina had a new stepfather and two new stepsisters, and a humming sense of betrayal pulling apart the bond with her mother—a bond Bina thought was unbreakable.
Eight years later, after too many lies and with trouble on her heels, Bina finds herself on the side of the road again, the city of her dreams calling for her. She has an old suitcase, a fresh black eye, and a room waiting for her at Catherine House, a young women’s residence in Greenwich Village with a tragic history, a vow of confidentiality, and dark, magical secrets. There, Bina is drawn to her enigmatic downstairs neighbor Monet, a girl who is equal parts intriguing and dangerous. As Bina’s lease begins to run out, and nightmare and memory get tangled, she will be forced to face the terrible truth of why she’s come to Catherine House and what it will take for her to leave...
Nova Ren Suma is such an amazing writer. One of my favorite books of all time is her book The Walls Around Us. You should definitely go pick that one up! While A Room Away from the Wolves didn't quite reach the awesomeness of TWAU, I still immensely enjoyed it. It was an exquisitely crafted story that left me hanging onto each and every word.
So, first of all, I love the inspiration for one of the parts of this book. Suma visited an old house with a portrait with eyes that followed her. The portrait became the inspiration for Catherine de Barra's portrait in Catherine House. Isn't that deliciously eery? The whole book is full of easter eggs like that.
The characters are amazing. Bina (Sabina) is such a tricky narrator, but I still grew attached. And the mother-daughter dynamic explored was so interesting. And dark. In fact, the thriller/mystery qualities of the book were so visceral and made me want to keep reading. There's also so many side characters such as Anjali and Lacey. Oh and, by the way, this is a ghost story... a strange, bizarre ghost story.
The ending of the story is a bit confusing, but it's beautiful and haunting and makes me want to read the book all over again so I can understand it better. Perfection.
Overall, I would recommend this book to those willing to be lost at points. You have to be willing to have things revealed slowly. Just read the pages and enjoy the beautiful words. This book is not for the faint of heart; it's not a book where everything is straightforward. It's so much more fun!
4/5 Stars
*Received for free in exchange for an honest review*
About the Author
Nova Ren Suma is the author of the YA novels THE WALLS AROUND US as well as the YA novels IMAGINARY GIRLS and 17 & GONE, which were both named 2014 Outstanding Books for the College Bound by YALSA. Her middle-grade novel, DANI NOIR, was reissued for a YA audience under the title FADE OUT. She has a BA in writing & photography from Antioch College and an MFA in fiction from Columbia University and has been awarded fiction fellowships from the New York Foundation for the Arts, the MacDowell Colony, Yaddo, the Djerassi Resident Artists Program, the Millay Colony, and an NEA fellowship for a residency at the Hambidge Center. She worked for years behind the scenes in publishing, at places such as HarperCollins, Penguin, Marvel Comics, and RAW Books, and now she teaches writing workshops. She is from various small towns across the Hudson Valley and lives and writes in New York City.
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