Review by jeffreyh321 -- Kalayla by Jeannie Nicholas

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jeffreyh321
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Latest Review: Kalayla by Jeannie Nicholas

Review by jeffreyh321 -- Kalayla by Jeannie Nicholas

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[Following is a volunteer review of "Kalayla" by Jeannie Nicholas.]
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3 out of 4 stars
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Kalayla is about the growth and development of three completely different people. It tells the story of an 11 year old girl named Kalayla, a 30 year old widow named Maureen, and a 70 year old woman named Lena trying to move away from her past. Each of these 3 women have their own complex past which have shaped them to the person they are today. When they all meet up by chance, they begin to understand and help one another from the history that haunts each of them.

Kalayla is very well written in its characters, particularly the 3 main women. Each character is multi layered, each with their own complex personality and past which subtly changes through the entire story. With every major event, all of the characters that were affected by the event have their personality changed bit by bit, demonstrating how their growth. The way each character speaks and thinks is unique, bringing everyone to life. Kalayla’s best feature is how it can give the information to its readers in a very subtle way.

However, the overall story progression of Kalayla has a few issues in it. There are some moments which feel like they should help push the story forward but instead, didn’t do much. A few moments in Kalayla feel as if they were written for no reason. In addition, sometimes the story felt more like a blunt retelling of past events. When talking about a character’s history, rather than introducing it in a more subtle way and letting the reader piece together their past, sometimes it was just all let out at once. The blunt nature of the way a character’s history was revealed to the reader brings down one of Kalayla’s best features, which is it’s subtle character growth.

I rate this book 3 out of 4 stars. Although Kalayla does have its negative aspects, overall it’s a very well written book with smart dialogue, a realistic and mostly well written story line, and deals with racism amongst family and domestic violence very well. The upsides greatly outweigh the majority of its downsides, making this a fantastic read despite the negative aspects that have been previously stated.

I recommend this book for young adults and older. Although younger audiences may find this book interesting, I feel that young adults and older would understand and connect to this book much better. The setting of Kalayla is in the year 2000, which generally means that anyone who is younger than the setting may not fully experience what life was like during that time.

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Kalayla
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