The Family Tree

The Family Tree by Carole Cadwalladr ~ (a very rickety review)

I've abandoned Persuasion (Jane Austen) for the moment. I had to get away from reading about people I don't like.

I opted instead, for what I thought might be a way to reflect on my constant need to understand families and why they stay together despite all the craziness and moodiness and truly weird things that happen in them.

This book contained a secret. Seems all families, except Indians, have secrets.

I remember my sister telling me once about a show she saw on Indians, and how they share all the information of the tribes with the young, so that they grow up with the knowledge .... I didn't get the part of *what exact knowledge* they grew up with, but I figured, knowledge is a good thing, and secrets can destroy lives.

The Family Tree had a secret in it. I don't want to give it away, but most likely, here's what might happen to you if you read it; you will begin the book and look for the possibilities because you will suspect something; you will read slowly through till about the middle and then you will stay up all night to get to it; to get the _part_ that tells you what you think you suspect.

There are three generations of women involved. Each a flawed woman and a cookie cutter product of their time. Are we all that? The reason these women hang in there together is not quite clear to me. Could be just that family-blood-thicker-than-water thing. Could be they have no other friends outside of the family that would like them if they knew everything. Maybe it’s beyond me still, and that’s the way families are until the end. Secrets are bonding with some kind of lovey glue.

But, when I think about it, I haven't hung in there with my cousins. It has nothing to do with secrets that I am aware of. There have been reasons I've let the relationships go. But most of that has to do with other people, my parents, their parents, or the way they treated my children… something. But I felt no reason to pursue the relationships. Good or bad decision, God will judge me on that.

However, back to The Family Tree ~ it does the telling of the story in a flip back and forth motion. I’m not crazy about that style. And I read quickly through the chapters on her present life, only looking for clues as to how her old life might have affected her current life.

I did notice as a child, no one answered our story tellers questions, And people really do that to kids, ignore their questions because the adults have decided the reasons for the questions, in their way of thinking, they are not worth addressing, but the child is innocent many times in their questions, but adults sometimes, they just can’t figure out how to answer them, so they ignore them, or maybe no one answered theirs, so once again, handing down that which has been handed down to us.

There is a great wire that passes through families. A wire connecting our looks, our tendencies, our gifts, our disabilities ~ there are things passed down of which we have no control. And the people who are set in the position of our parents and grandparents may have not a clue how to handle such things about us.. So, it’s a hop, skip, and a jump …and there you are a grown up, and if you can’t work with what you have, oh well, good luck then ….

But the book is okay. Not great, but okay, maybe even good, maybe not though, just okay maybe.

There were details in it that I didn’t deem necessary to the story or maybe I just didn’t see the connection for these things. Certain details of people's very personal minutes don't really interest me all that much.

I thought of a song line after I finished the book, "Looking for love in all the wrong places," because, after all, aren't we all just looking for love?