The Turtle House
Fiction
Harper
February 20, 2024
Advance reader copy
304
Free from publisher
Moving between late 1990s small-town Texas to pre-World War II Japan and occupied Tokyo, an emotionally engaging literary debut about a grandmother and granddaughter who connect over a beloved lost place and the secrets they both carry. It’s spring 1999, and 25-year-old Lia Cope and her prickly 73-year-old grandmother, Mineko, are sharing a bedroom in Curtain, Texas, the ranching town where Lia grew up and Mineko began her life as a Japanese war bride.
Both women are at a turning point: Mineko, long widowed, moved in with her son and daughter-in-law after a suspicious fire destroyed the Cope family ranch house, while Lia, an architect with a promising career in Austin, has unexpectedly returned under circumstances she refuses to explain. Though Lia never felt especially close to her grandmother, the two grow close sharing late-night conversations. Mineko tells stories of her early life in Japan, of the war that changed everything, and of her two great a man named Akio Sato and an abandoned Japanese country estate they called the Turtle House, where their relationship took root.
As Mineko reveals more of her early life—tales of innocent swimming lessons that blossom into something more, a friendship nurtured across oceans, totems saved and hidden, the heartbreak of love lost too soon—Lia comes to understand the depth of her grandmother’s pain and sacrifice and sees her Texas family in a new light. She also recognizes that it’s she who needs to come clean—about the budding career she abandoned and the mysterious man who keeps calling. When Mineko’s adult children decide, against her wishes, to move her into an assisted living community, she and Lia devise a plan to bring a beloved lost place to life, one that they hope will offer the safety and sense of belonging they both need, no matter the cost. A story of intergenerational friendship, family, coming of age, identity, and love, The Turtle House illuminates the hidden lives we lead, the secrets we hold close, and what it truly means to find home again when it feels lost forever.
My review:
First and foremost, this cover is absolutely stunning! If you are a reader who picks up books based on their covers, this one is for you 🙂 Most of the pertinent facts about this book are in the summary above, so I'm not going to reiterate that in my review. I will say that this was very well written for a debut, and I would not have known this was the author's first book. As with a lot of books with a timeline that goes back and forth, I was more drawn to the stories of Mineko's life in Japan, and even her present story. I thought Lia was a good source for Mineko's storytelling, although I felt her career story was not as compelling and didn't add much to the plot. I did however enjoy the way she used her architect degree to recreate The Turtle House from Mineko's memories. Both characters were very well drawn, and while the ending was melancholy, I appreciated that it didn't tie everything up in a happy ever after, which would have seemed too contrived for my taste. I thought the descriptions of Japan pre-WWII were very interesting.
Lovely writing and characters equate to the beauty of this cover. I loved Mineko and her story, what a stoic and brave woman, who just wanted to get back to the place that made her the happiest. Well worth the read, and a place face out on your bookshelf!
