After the death of her mother when she was a young and the subsequent abandonment of her father, Althea, the oldest child, took charge of her three younger siblings. She eventually married, continued caring for her siblings, had children of her owner and built a successful business. The story begins digging deeper into the lives of the siblings and Althea's children after her and her husband, Proctor's, arrest and conviction for fraud. With Althea in prison, the rest of the family tries to continue on without the her direction. Althea and Proctor's two daughters become increasingly more troubled while the siblings confront issues from their past and the ramifications of those issues in their lives today.

This story seamlessly follows and weaves together multiple storylines giving the reader empathy for a family torn apart by a loving mother's death and the struggle to cope with the fall-out on many fronts: eating disorders, abandonment, poverty, abuse, and ultimately, white collar crime. In this story, good intentions do not always end up being what is best, and even though life does not work out perfectly, it works out the best it can when there is a will to make it work.

As a fan of Terry McMillan's writing, I was excited to read a new author that she recommended. I was not disappointed. The characters are well-drawn and sympathetic, and the plot is complex and not easily wrapped up with a happy ending for all. Relationships were complicated and emotional. I especially liked the fact that the chapters were written from the characters' different points of view so the reader can hear the voices of different narrators.

Starts slow, but is a wonderfully vivid story of complex women, and complex relationships.
I found myself rooting for all of the sisters of both generations.

Anissa Grays's debut novel is filled with anguish, and a love that is raw and sought and slowly recovered through the telling of this story. This multi-generational telling of a family of women coping with the past and future of their lives connects us with them and the community that they live in. Beautifully written.

Great multigenerational family drama. Too many missing parents in the story. Very well written, the story moves at a good pace. Could easily have read another 200 pages with everyone's backstory.

I was a tiny generous with the fourth star. This book was so intense and layered, but as the author pulled the strings to complete the story I felt it unraveled that beautiful texture she had going. Thank you NetGalley for an advance read of this book.
I love when Proctor says he saw grief when he looked at Althea the first time. I think that is the big motivator of this book. Grief, huge grief and the author makes us feel this gut-wrenching loss. But the loss just goes on and on. Destructive behaviors, fractured relationships, mis or non communication just battle it out in this story. But instead of dealing with the conflict as richly as she set it up, I felt it left the ending flat.

This book is amazing. I loved the diversity of the characters and their perspective of the same event unfolding. I loved the age range, the life experiences and everything that came with it. Althea was so heart breaking and her twins were so real. Everyone was flushed out and 3 dimensional character-wise. It was a great book that I'll be thinking about for weeks to come.