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The Daughters: A Novel by Adrienne Celt
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The Daughters: A Novel (edition 2015)

by Adrienne Celt (Author)

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1365199,198 (2.88)4
"When Lulu was a child, her strong-willed grandmother Ada filled her head with fables of the family's enchanted history in the Polish countryside. A fantastical lore took hold-an incantatory mix of young love, desperate hope, and one sinister bargain that altered the family's history forever. Since that fateful pact, Ada tells Lulu, each mother in their family has been given a daughter, but each daughter has exacted an essential cost from her mother. Ada was the first to recognize young Lulu's transcendent talent, spotting it early on in their cramped Chicago apartment, then watching her granddaughter ascend to dizzying heights in packed international concert halls. But as the curse predicted, Lulu's mother, a sultry and elusive jazz singer, disappeared into her bitterness in the face of Lulu's superior talent-before disappearing from her family's life altogether. Now, in the early days of her own daughter's life, Lulu now finds herself weighing her overwhelming love for her child against the burden of her family's past"--Amazon.com.… (more)
Member:MHanover10
Title:The Daughters: A Novel
Authors:Adrienne Celt (Author)
Info:Liveright (2015), 272 pages
Collections:Your library, Currently reading, Wishlist, To read, Read but unowned, Favorites
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Tags:to-read

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The Daughters by Adrienne Celt

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Showing 5 of 5
This is a nontraditional tale of mothers and daughters across generations, with a little magic and a curse tossed in for good measure. At the center of the story is Lulu and her newborn daughter Kara; before she became a mother, Lulu was an internationally famous singer but now she fears her voice is gone. The novel places Lulu's fears and experience within the context of a family curse of mothers giving birth to daughters who then ellipse them. It's an interesting story, but it just didn't really speak to me and I struggle to finish the book, despite it being relatively short. ( )
  wagner.sarah35 | Apr 19, 2019 |
Lulu is an opera singer, and a new mother, and a lover of stories. Particularly the fairy tale-like stories her Polish grandmother would tell about her own mother. But the stories are troubling, too, as they include a deal made with the devil for the birth of a daughter, and a curse that may have been passed down through the family, mother to daughter.

It's a beautifully written novel, with smooth, lovely prose, and it does some interesting things in weaving Lulu's real life with the fantasy of her stories. I'm also rather impressed, because opera and babies are two things I have very, very little interest in, and it actually managed to make me feel a connection to both.

I will admit, though, that at some point I started to feel just a little impatient with it, as Lulu's own story felt like it ought to be going somewhere but seemed not to actually be progressing at all. But the ending, while it perhaps didn't entirely satisfy that feeling, did work for me in its own quiet way. ( )
  bragan | Dec 8, 2018 |
This book is pretty much like my Roomba, which I'm not getting rid of, but it doesn't quite get the whole job done !

The Daughters has lots to offer and sometimes it delivers, but sometimes it goes astray or dead-ends. Thats the price you pay for the ease of the rest !

Based on what I read here , I'd read a new version of "through the looking glass" by Celt or just abt anything else she has a go at - this one felt a bit pieced together from assignments or writing group short stories - some of it was incongruous and could have been kept back for another character's story. ( )
  nkmunn | Nov 17, 2018 |
The daughters by Celt_ Adrienne
Story follows one of the daughters, Greta and her musical career in Chicago and over in Poland where the family originated from.
The sisters all seem to have a curse placed on their daughters from birth.
Like how the story goes back in time to when the curse originated.
I received this book from National Library Service for my BARD (Braille Audio Reading Device). ( )
  jbarr5 | Sep 16, 2016 |
Because I'm careful in selecting my reads and am not shy about not finishing a book I don't find interesting, it is rare that I give only one or two stars to a book I've finished. This one got two stars. It was pleasant reading but when I was done I shrugged my shoulders and said "So what?" By tomorrow I won't remember what it was about and by this time next week I'll have forgotten that I read it.

Library book. ( )
  seeword | Sep 20, 2015 |
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"When Lulu was a child, her strong-willed grandmother Ada filled her head with fables of the family's enchanted history in the Polish countryside. A fantastical lore took hold-an incantatory mix of young love, desperate hope, and one sinister bargain that altered the family's history forever. Since that fateful pact, Ada tells Lulu, each mother in their family has been given a daughter, but each daughter has exacted an essential cost from her mother. Ada was the first to recognize young Lulu's transcendent talent, spotting it early on in their cramped Chicago apartment, then watching her granddaughter ascend to dizzying heights in packed international concert halls. But as the curse predicted, Lulu's mother, a sultry and elusive jazz singer, disappeared into her bitterness in the face of Lulu's superior talent-before disappearing from her family's life altogether. Now, in the early days of her own daughter's life, Lulu now finds herself weighing her overwhelming love for her child against the burden of her family's past"--Amazon.com.

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