Book Blurb:
Housebreaking by Colleen Hubbard: Home is certainly not where Del’s heart is. After a local scandal led to her parents’ divorce and the rest of her family turned their backs on her, Del left her small town and cut off contact. Now, with both of her parents gone, a chance has arrived for Del to retaliate. Her uncle wants the one thing Del inherited: the family home. Instead of handing the place over, and with no other resources at her disposal, Del decides she will tear the place apart herself—piece by piece. But Del will soon discover, the task stirs up more than just old memories as relatives—each in their own state of unraveling—come knocking on her door. This spare, strange, magical book is a story not only about the powerlessness and hurt that run through a family but also about the moments when brokenness can offer us the rare chance to start again.
My Review: 3.5 stars
Housebreaking by Colleen Hubbard was at once oddly soothing and would then jarringly jump to my not understanding where the novel was taking me. I’m still stuck on whether this was pure brilliance and I missed something, or it is what it is, an unusual story about a young woman trying to fix her life, in the craziest way possible.
Del, an adrift soul, lost both her parents and lives with one of her dad’s much older friends. She doesn’t brush her hair, often smells and gets by through inconsistent employment. I am someone who roots for the underdog, in fiction and in real life, so I started this book, rooting for Del. She’s pit against her narcissistic uncle and his family who want to scrap her family home to use the land for their own benefit. She agrees with a few important caveats, which leads her to deconstruct her house and move it to a track of land on the edge of the property. This is not metaphoric; she literally does this, pipe by pipe, beam by beam, wire by wire. This was exhausting for her and frankly, for the reader as well.
As much as I started with an affinity towards Del, it wasn’t long before I just wanted to slap her into shape. But alas, just in time she did start to get it together. I began to understand her goal more clearly and more importantly, got to watch her put herself out there.
Her relationship with Tym (her father’s friend) added a bit of humor that the book needed for some levity. And her taking a chance with Billy was also a wonderful addition.
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Never Flinch: A Novel
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