Book Review: Birds of Paradise
Birds of Paradise: A Novel by Diana Abu-Jaber
My rating: 4 of 5 stars
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.
By this book at:
Amazon
(I received this book courtesy of the LibraryThing Early Reviewers program.)
