Following the lives of women in three countries, Of Women and Salt captures the struggle women face everyday and the added complications of family, ICE, and addiction. This haunting novel examines motherhood and legacy and is a valuable read.

This was a really beautiful generation-spanning family story. Gabriela Garcia does a fantastic job of writing these characters, who readers find themselves invested in almost immediately.

This is a book about a family that is stressed and fractured, and another family that is split up and reunited. It's about mothers and daughters. But, most of all, it's about addiction.

If you have lived in or around the world of addiction, there are certain things that you know, certain things that jump out at you and you recognize because they are in your psyche. Jeannette, the protagonist, is an addict, and although her story involves other aspects of her life, it is her addiction that sadly, defines her.

I can't say I loved the book because I found it heavy. It is beautifully written and I love that all of the characters are women. There is a lot going on in the novel, and I found out that it's also because out started off as short stories, so merging the many events had to take some careful crafting.

I thought this was a very beautiful and heart rending book of stories. The characters were so fascinating and well written that I almost wanted each of them to have their own novel. I did feel like some of the stories cut off before they were resolved, or before the meat of what was being told actually happened, but that might also just be the nature of short stories.

Garcia has written some compelling prose and constructed some interesting and dynamic relationships, but ultimately tries to do too much with this book. It felt as though she was trying to write about *everything* in this novel. That this book was responsible for all of Latinidad, which is an impossible task. I do understand the impulse knowing that so often Latine women, and other women of color, are not given a second chance to tell their stories. Unfortunately OF WOMEN AND SALT doesn’t come together with all that Garcia is attempting to do. It is ambitious but not satisfying.

Phenomenal story sprawling generations. The writing was descriptive without venturing into unnecessary and the characters were incredibly real. I am usually confused when different stories jump forward and backward in time, but Garcia guided me with such ease through these transitions. Highly recommend for bookclubs.

In modern-day Miami, Jeanette is a daughter of Cuban immigrants struggling with drug addiction. When her neighbor Gloria is detained by ICE, Jeanette takes in Gloria’s daughter and is forced to reckon with her own family trauma. The story then travels back through five generations of mothers and daughters, each burdened by the difficult choices of motherhood and family legacy.

This packs such an incredible amount of history and characters into only 200 pages! Garcia has a gift for showing us so much about a person through one short snippet of their lives. Beautifully written, powerful, and definitely worth its salt.

Wonderfully written and beautifully sad - I just wish it was longer! I could have read on and on about this family's journey. Thank you NetGalley.

Thank you for the opportunity to read this novel. I was not able to get into this story at this time and will not be leaving a full review.

Of Women and Salt is a stunning debut covering multiple generations, cultures, and countries. This novel focuses on the relationships between mothers and daughters, and how these relationships build upon the generation before. Jeannette is still repairing her relationships with her mother, Carmen, when she provides refuge to her neighbor’s daughter after she is detained by ICE. Carmen, trying to understand Jeannette’s behavior, looks back at the relationship with her own mother and the history behind her immigration from Cuba. This novel is an homage to the resilience of women and a mother’s love. I absolutely loved Garcia’s style of writing and the distinct voice she gives each of the women.

3.5 rounded down on this rating. This one took me forever to read. The plot to me fell flat. It felt like a bunch of short stories tied together loosely. I was really excited to read about Cuban immigration into the US, but this one didn't hit the mark.

So beautifully written and absolutely captivating. This is one of the stories that will stick with you.

This is such a rich novel. It's a multigenerational family story that reaches back to the ten years' war in Cuba and leads up to the present. This is one of the few books where I would say that I wish it was longer because there are so many interesting threads that I'd love to have seen develop even further. It's a novel about migration (legal and illegal), domestic violence, parent-child relationships, the legacy of Cuba's independence movement, finding home, addiction - in other words, a lot. It's a completely absorbing read, although to me it feels a little unfinished.

History woven into loss, this dual timeline book was beautifully written. Shedding light on the tragedies of the past and how they seem to follow us in the future- this book shows the tragic side of immigration and what is lost and purposefully left behind.

I read this for background reading for promotions we have been running on BookBrowse (both an early reader program with feature at time of sale - First Impressions; and a Book Club discussion) - you can see both the reader reviews and discussion linked from https://www.bookbrowse.com/bb_briefs/detail/index.cfm/ezine_preview_number/1547

Of Women and Salt is a tale of family legacy that juxtaposes the story of four generations of matrilineal descendants in a Cuban family spanning 150 years with the experiences of a lone Salvadoran mother and daughter caught up in the bureaucracy and dehumanization of modern-day US deportation. From a 19th century Cuban cigar factory to present day Miami on the one hand, to a border detention center and an arbitrary landing place in Mexico on the other, the novel’s chapters read like a series of interrelated short stories told from a variety of female perspectives.

Jeanette’s life is the most common thread throughout the book. She lives in a Miami neighborhood where everyone minds their own business. A recovering addict, Jeannette is doing temp work from home when Ana, the daughter of a single mother living next door, is dropped off by the babysitter to an empty home. A moment of connection follows as the young girl knocks on Jeannette’s door: “The girl scans her surroundings, and her eyes stop at Jeanette’s kitchen window. They stare at each other.”

Earlier in the day, Jeanette had seen ICE agents raid the home and take the little girl’s mother away. Still, Jeanette’s decision to open her door is not easy. After eventually letting the girl in, she feeds her and puts her to bed, then closes the door to her bedroom and Googles “What happens to children if their parents are deported?”

The next day, Jeanette is visited by her mother Carmen, a woman Jeanette describes as “Pearls, slacks, wrinkle cream, a box of blank thank-you notes. Always put together. Always carrying a whiff of her own success and composure like a cardigan at the shoulders. You look at her and just know: here is a woman with answers. So often Jeanette has wondered how she came from such a woman.”

When Carmen discovers her daughter’s desire to take care of Ana, she is incensed, saying, “Jeanette. This is not a game. You’re on probation. You really want to mess everything up again?” The irony is that Carmen, a Cuban immigrant herself, has no compassion for the little girl’s plight. Jeanette asks her, “You’re an immigrant. . . . Do you ever think about how Cubans get all this special treatment . . . Don’t you think it’s your responsibility to give a shit about other people?”

And so, the intrigue begins, why did Carmen leave Cuba so many years ago if it wasn’t for political reasons? After hosting Thanksgiving dinner, Carmen shares her perspective on her homeland in relation to her new country: “Cuba this, Cuba that. Cuba Cuba Cuba. Why anyone left a place only to reminisce, to carry its streets into every conversation, to see every moment through the eyes of some imagined loss, was beyond her. Miami existed as such a hollow receptacle of memory, a shadow city, full of people who needed a place to put their past into perspective. Not her. She lived in the present.”

Or she tries to. Of Woman and Salt proves that no matter how much one wishes to disassociate with the past, our lives are inextricably wound up with the actions of those who came before us.

Carmen’s line goes back to Maria Isabel in Camagüey, Cuba, in the year 1866 rolling cigars while her future husband reads aloud from Victor Hugo. Violence abounds for the family and much is kept secret. When Jeanette travels to Cuba in search of answers about her mother, her past, even something of herself, she is hosted by Maydelis, a cousin of her own generation.

Here, the novel offers back-to-back chapters from both women’s points of view, a terrific contrast of worldview. Maydelis’ first reaction to this cousin from America is that she is nothing more than a tourist, blind to her family’s struggle. Maydelis observes, “Jeanette offers to pay but she’s carrying only divisa, not moneda nacional. Constantly she complains about the unfairness of the double-currency system, about how mad she feels paying a commission to exchange dollars into CUCs. There seem so many other easy injustices to point to; I’m frequently amused by what catches her fancy.”

Meanwhile, Jeanette notes of Maydelis, “All she wants to talk about is the United States, what it's like over there . . . she lists kinds of people that exist in Cuba—freakies, emos, Mickeys, repas. She lists what they wear and what music they listen to and where they hang out and I realize every country is different but the same. Every country has its own lunch tables.”

And then there is the plight of Gloria and Ana, mother and daughter torn apart by an ICE raid and reunited in a border detention center for families many months after Jeanette discovers Ana at her front door. In a chapter told from Gloria’s point of view, she shares a memory of a Christian missionary who told her as a child, “Despite having so little. . . you are so happy. You could teach the children in my country so much about what’s really important in life.”

Gloria explains that she had never thought of herself as having little. She says of the missionary, “I wondered what she had expected: sad poor people being sad and poor at every sad, poor moment of their lives? She mistook happiness for what it was—how we survive and build lives out of the strings that we hold.” The women in these pages do just that—they build lives out of the strings they hold.

Gloria’s assessment of an outsider judging what she couldn’t possibly understand underscores a recurring theme in this book, aided by the narrative technique of multiple points of view. Examples of racism and the stratification to which human beings are subject fill Gabriela Garcia’s novel. When Jeanette is in Cuba she observes her grandmother’s blatant racism toward a neighbor who is Black, but she notes, “it isn’t as though Black Cubans fare better in Miami, where racism is polite, quiet. This is the fact: In Miami, Cuban is synonymous with white. In Miami, Cubans will scoff when you call them Latino. ‘I’m not Latino, I’m Cuban,’ they will say. By which I mean, I am white, another kind of white you don’t know about, outsider.”

Of Women and Salt is a beautifully written novel that turns like a kaleidoscope in the light, illuminating the blurry delineation of who is an insider and who an outsider. The chapters build upon each other, offering the reader cumulative insight and a sense of dramatic irony. But even while the reader understands much more than any given character ever does, the author also allows precious white space where the reader can come to her own conclusions. This book is an achievement, with short-story-like chapters that nevertheless follow a satisfying arc. Even better, they culminate in a redeeming and emotional ending.

Relevant, timely, heartbreaking and perseverance are a few of the words that popped into my head at the conclusion of this book. The story traces the history or a family of Cuban women from early times to the present.
The timeline was fascinating, especially the beginning when the locals, poorly paid but glad to have a job, are read to each day as they roll cigars. The plot escalates when the plight of immigrants hoping to make a better life in the US are stunted and almost wiped out in their endeavor.
What's especially satisfying in the memorable writing is the strength of the women characters. There are a few who fall apart but they are portrayed with compassion and insight into their plight. The writing is so deeply felt and the book so important today.,

A multi-generational tale of mothers and daughters, immigration, racism and choices made. From present day Miami to 19th Century Cuba, family members try to make sense of their history and family. Intersecting with the family are a mother and daughter who end up deported and left stranded in Mexico. This is a difficult novel to review only because it holds so much. There is the history of Cuba and how it affected some of the characters, the choices the women had to make due to circumstances of the times, and the way that people who have immigrated or tried to are treated. It is a beautiful piece of work that will grab you and tug on your heart.

This book was emotionally stirring, and gave an intricate look at the challenges faces by various generations of Cuban women. I enjoyed the change in timelines and perspectives, and thought they were very well done. I spent most of the book wondering how threads would connect, and the author tied things together nicely. It maybe felt like it ended abruptly, but not in a bad way!

Gabriela Garcia's Of Women and Salt is set during the Obama administration, but it's very much a book of our time. The novel explores the complicated relationships among different generations of women in Cuba and Miami, with the earliest generations living in Cuba during the revolution and the more recent generations in not-quite-present-day Florida. It also explores the relationship between a separate mother-daughter pair, Salvadorans who are living in the U.S. without documentation. Many of these relationships are strained, and we, the readers, gradually find out why, while the characters themselves remain unaware of much of the story that readers are able to put together.

Of Women and Salt is neither a tidy book nor a happy one, but it is a very human one. Garcia's characters are clearly presented in their imperfections, with no magic bullets or deus ex machina moments to resolve the challenges they face. One could almost say that in a way each of these women is a failure—but they aren't. They are doing the best they can given their life circumstances. And Garcia tells her story in a way that lets us find something of value in each of these imperfect women.

There are any number of reasons to read this book: Garcia packs it full of moments that resonate. And the lack of a tidy ending gives readers one more more reason to care about the lives of each of these women.

I received an electronic review copy of this title from the publisher; the opinions are my own.