De erfenis

by Henriette Lazaridis Power, Henriette Power, Fanneke Cnossen (Translator)

De erfenis verweeft het leven van Callie met de oorlogsherinneringen van haar moeder Clio, en het tragische geheim dat haar verleden overschaduwt. Als Callie de erfenis van haar lievelingsoom op orde brengt, stuit ze daarbij op steeds meer verzet van haar moeder, die al haar vragen naar het verleden nors afwijst. Terwijl ze de puzzelstukjes van het familiegeheim bij elkaar probeert te leggen, dreigt haar eigen leven uiteen te vallen: een roekeloze affaire brengt haar ophanden zijnde huwelijk in gevaar en ze wordt gedwongen haar eigen verleden en toekomst opnieuw onder ogen te zien.

Genres: Historical Fiction, Fiction, World War II, Greece, Book Club, Contemporary, Historical

368 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 2013

About the author

Henriette Lazardis grew up in the Boston area, the only child of expat parents, speaking Greek as her first language.
​
Her devotion to storytelling led her to degrees in English literature from Middlebury College, Oxford University (where she was a Rhodes Scholar), and the University of Pennsylvania. She went on to teach English literature at Harvard for ten years before quitting to write full time and raise her two children. She now teaches writing at Grub Street in Boston and is founding editor of The Drum Literary Magazine.

Her work has appeared in many publications, including ELLE, Narrative, Salamander, New England Review, The Millions, The New York Times, and the Huffington Post.

See Henriette Lazaridis and Henriette Power

Reviews

[Belinda · Rating 3 out of 5]

3 sterren - Nederlandse paperback 🦋🦋🦋
Helaas te weinig dieptegang. De verhaallijnen zijn okay en hadden, iets verder uitgediept, ook boeiend kunnen zijn. Geen slecht boek maar ook niet Een aanrader. 🌷🌷🌷

[Dale Harcombe · Rating 2 out of 5]

Family secrets form the basis of quite a lot so stories and usually pique my interest. This one seemed to be no exception. It starts in Boston, year 2000 with a phone call to Callie from her cousin. Her cousin Aliki informs her that her uncle Nestor is dead and he has left the contents of his house to Callie. Why didn’t Callie’s mother Clio ring Callie and tell her about the funeral and her uncle? They have always had a strained relationship and Callie surmises her mother doesn’t really want her to come back to Greece and go through the house. Why? What could she want to keep hidden? The other story is set in Greece 1940 with Clio, when she is young during World War 2 and during Italian occupation. These two events have a profound effect on Clio’s life.
I was intrigued by the blurb of this book, but for me it never lived up to what was promised. I found Callie to be an annoying character who makes reckless and stupid decisions. I didn’t take to Clio either. Not liking the main characters makes it hard to get into the story and care about what is happening to them. In the end, there just wasn’t enough to totally engage me. I read it purely because it was there rather than because I was involved.
It was an okay story but not the riveting read I had expected it would be. Despite the interesting Greek setting, it just seemed filled with a lot of unlikeable characters and information I didn’t really care to know about. I found myself skimming. Others may enjoy it more than I did.

[Kaye · Rating 2 out of 5]

When Callie Brown's Uncle Nestor dies in his native country of Greece, he leaves all his belongings to Callie. For some inexplicable reason, Callie's mother, Clio, does not want Callie to leave Boston and come to Greece to go through her inheritance. There's a bit of mystery there why this is so. Is Clio hiding something from her past, maybe a secret that she shared with Nestor and is afraid Callie will find out.

Told from two different viewpoints, I found this story had a few interesting bits but mostly I found it boring. The best parts of the plot were told from Clio's point of view during WWII.Greece's part in the war was most interesting and the author did a good job of imparting sense of place and time.

Calli's viewpoint from the present made me think of that phrase "make a mountain out of a molehill." All the "secrets" that were supposedly unearthed were much ado about nothing. They didn't explain why Callie and her mother had such a strained relationship. The reader is only privy to Callie's thoughts that her parents had a tempestuous marriage and the spillover from that left Callie and her mother cold. Callie also blamed her own relationship problems on her parents marriage. Okay, so she had baggage from years ago. So what! Work on it not wallow in it.

Her present day relationship with her fiancé is strained to say the least. This plays a part in the story.

I found the two main characters to be completely unlikeable although after reading Clio's point of view, I did understand her more. Callie could not redeem herself with me after her behavior at Carnivale while she was visiting her cousins in Patros. At times I found myself tempted to skim over some of the pages regarding her mother's stories.
This one was a "meh" read to me. I could take it or leave it. That's just my reading experience with the book. Others may love it.

Disclosure: a review copy of the book was provided by LT in their early reviewers program.

[Amy · Rating 4 out of 5]

Books take me places. Sometimes the journey is through time and memory; sometimes it's to a distant place, bringing the flavor of the land or the scent of the wind to me through words. Sometimes the journey is internal, echoing an experience of my own. The Clover House is the rare novel that braided these three types of journeys together for me, and bound them neatly inside its cover.

There are two threads of story in this book. One follows Callie Brown, who heads to Greece to receive her inheritance left to her by her beloved uncle, who has recently died; the other is the back story of her mother's life as a girl in Greece. The relationship between Callie and Clio, her mother has always been intense, difficult, and distant, though seemingly, Clio's relationship with everyone is fraught with tension. There is brittleness and bitterness in both women, the tension a palpable element in their relationship as well as how they relate to the close-knit kin who live in Patras. The damaged relationship with her mother has made it difficult for Callie to accept closeness and love at all, and she determines to try and sort things out with her mother, as well as discover her real feelings about Jonah, her fiance back in the US. Plus, she is determined to unravel the mystery of what fractured her mother's ability to love, and fractured her family as well.

What made this book so vivid for me were the descriptions of Carnival in Patras, and the picture drawn of Greece during Clio's childhood, how the approach of WWII and the days that followed. I visited Greece once, over 40 years ago, and still can recall the quality of light on the hillsides, and a special kind of earthy reality to the land. Power's writing helped transport me through time and space, to revisit, and also learn more about this land she so clearly, and so dearly loves.

My own relationship with my mother was almost diametrically opposed to the mother-daughter dyad in the book. But as Callie sorts through the possessions of a lifetime, left by her uncle, I was sorting through the remnants of my mother's life. It was a life I thought I knew fairly well, but the process of clearing out her possessions and souvenirs has opened new dimensions, shown me new aspects, and even told me new tales of a life well lived. Callie's experience so clearly shadowed my own task (when I was not busy reading) that at times I had to take breaks to remember which discoveries were hers and which were mine. I also learned, as Callie did, that the stories we grew up with may just be reflections of what actually happened. I wrestle now with the decision to maintain the stories my siblings and I were told, or do I go for historical accuracy? Or a blending of the two?

What is ultimately important, and what The Clover House weaves so well, is that the fabric of human existence, the story of our lives, is not perfect. We may have uncertainties, we may make mistakes, we may make bad decisions, but the outcomes are not final. We can reweave the pattern or mend the broken thread -- but to do so takes a strength of character, and a strength of heart. This book is about finding that courage.


Many thanks to LibraryThing's Early Reviewer program and to the publisher for sending me a copy of this book.

(After reading the book, I went to the author's website, which delighted me for many reasons, including her "about" note and the wonderful pictures of her family back in Greece. I can see where she got some of her ideas for the story, but the imagery that brought it to life for me was her own skill with words.)

[Coleen · Rating 3 out of 5]

This is another of those books that lured me in by its promise of family secrets. Throw in some Greek heritage and flashbacks to the Italian & German occupation in Greece during World War 2, and more likely than not I'll be sucked in even more easily. Oh, and an appealing cover never hurts either. However. That being said, my feeling was only lukewarm on this one. With characters only semi-likeable and a plot line that moved along a little too slowly, I never really found myself gripped by this novel at any point. I didn't dislike this story, but it fell short for me.

[Sarah · Rating 3 out of 5]

This was OK. I had trouble connecting with the characters- they just weren't likable enough for me to get that invested into their drama.

[A. Somers · Rating 2 out of 5]

I had a difficult time connecting with the main character in this story.Callie's relationship problems were supposed to be a result of her parent's tormentuous relationship, but the book spends more time delving into her mother's closely guarded family secrets and not enough time exploring why these secret's affecting Callie's parent's marriage. I never quite get the connection. I also wish I had known more about Greece history during WWII. I think it would have helped me to understand more of the back story.

[Belinda Vlasbaard · Rating 4 out of 5]

3,5 sterren - Nederlandse paperback
Het verhaal is geschreven vanuit twee personages en de daarbij behorende periodes. Het ene personage is Calliope (Callie), de dochter van een Griekse moeder (Clio) en een Amerikaanse vader. Nee niet de Calliope uit Grey's atonomy.

Dit deel van het verhaal speelt zich af in het heden. Callie is opgegroeid in Amerika en haar moeder is na de dood van haar vader teruggekeerd naar Griekenland, naar haar geboorteplaats Patras. Callie is verloofd met Jona en hoewel ze van hem houdt, vraagt ze zich af of ze wel met hem wil trouwen. Ze heeft bij haar ouders niet echt een positief beeld gekregen van het huwelijk. Callie’s oom Nestor is overleden en laat haar de inboedel van zijn huis na. Dit bericht krijgt ze niet van haar moeder, met wie ze slecht contact heeft, maar via haar nicht Aliki. Callie is verbaasd dat haar moeder haar dit bericht niet doorgeeft. Ze heeft het idee dat zij liever niet wil dat ze komt, vanwege een gebeurtenis in het verleden waar ze niet achter mag komen. Callie besluit naar Patras te gaan en probeert erachter te komen wat deze geheimen zijn.

Het andere gezichtspunt in het verhaal is van Clio en speelt zich af rond de periode van de Tweede Wereldoorlog. Langzaam maar zeker wordt een tipje van de sluier opgelicht van de geheimen waar haar moeder mee leeft en wat zij allemaal heeft meegemaakt tijdens de Tweede Wereldoorlog.

Callie ontdekt via allerlei papieren en foto’s die ze tegenkomt wat haar moeder heeft meegemaakt, zodat enkele zaken duidelijker worden. Dit geeft haar niet alleen inzicht in haar moeder, maar ook in zichzelf.
Dit boek was de debuutroman van Henriette Power, die een prettige schrijfstijl heeft.

Wel had ik zowel met de persoon Callie als met haar moeder moeite, het zijn geen personen waar ik sympathie voor kon opbrengen.

  

[Stephanie · Rating 3 out of 5]

I enjoyed the Greek setting in this book...Learning about there carnival, traditions, family dynamics, etc. BUT, I didn't care for the self-sabatoging main character. I understand that her personality is what drives the storyline, but I wanted her to get her shit together the entire time I was reading. In real life, I would have lost patience with her before ever getting to the end of the story...

[Ann · Rating 3 out of 5]

This novel started out with a great storyline. But it quickly went downhill and I found myself skimming some of the chapters.

[Heidi Hooten · Rating 2 out of 5]

Meh.

[Peggy · Rating 4 out of 5]

Callie lives in New York with her fiancee when she is summoned to her hometown in Greece. Her uncle has died and has left her all of his belongings in his will. When she arrives in Greece the meeting with her mother is the same as it has always been. They have never been close and could never get along. Apparently her mother has a secret and Callie needs to find out what it is. Among her uncle's belongings she finds more information and she needs to find the real story in order to heal her mothers insecurities.
A well written story and also a learning lesson that secrets can sometimes ruin relationships that can change everything in a persons life.

[Sandy · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book breathes (sometimes gasps) the effects of war. Survival in wartime means stepping outside oneself and doing what must be done. Then, the rest of your days, you deal with it. The bitter truth is that you take all the rest of your future family, friends and basically anyone in your path along too.

[Chelsie · Rating 3 out of 5]

I enjoyed the storyline of this novel, however I struggled with the one character and some of the comparison lines the author used. Overall, it was interesting to read about how quickly a wealthy family could have everything taken from them during the war.

[Zwaan Maria · Rating 3 out of 5]

Nice story but a bit empty. Same struggle between family members without a clear ending or summit.

[Ruth · Rating 3 out of 5]

Calliope "Callie" Brown, a first-generation Greek-American living in Boston, is shocked when she receives a phone call from her cousin notifying her of their uncle Nestor's death, and that she has been named heiress of all his worldly goods. At first uninterested in claiming the unexpected bequest, Callie's interest is piqued when her estranged mother Clio, who returned to her Greek homeland following the death of Callie's father, makes a rare call in an blatant attempt to dissuade Callie from fulfilling her uncle's dying wish. Eager to escape her commitment-ready boyfriend, Callie makes arrangements to journey to Patras, Greece, determined to discover a clue among her uncle's possessions to her own thorny relationship with her mother. As a child, Callie was captivated by her mother's stories of growing up in Greece, stories that painted an almost idyllic portrait of life in a world that was, in actuality, riddled by conflict. But her mother's stories are the only truth Callie knows, a truth she stubbornly clings to in the face of familial discord and her own increasingly fractured life. The deeper Callie delves into her uncle's treasures, the closer she comes to uncovering truths about her mother and family that threaten to fracture already-fragile bonds, unless those involved choose to accept Nestor's final bequests -- the light of truth and the balm of forgiveness.

The Clover House possesses a fascinating premise -- combining Callie's contemporary search for meaning and identity with stories from her mother's childhood, Power spins a highly-relatable tale of tension-fraught parent-child relationships peppered with the fascinating (and arguably generally un-studied) history of Greece during and after the second World War. As an amateur student of the era, I loved the opportunity Power provides of diving deep into the wartime experiences of a culture and its history that in my experience has not been given wide exposure in books or films. Through Callie, Power taps into not only I think a very human tendency to romanticize the past, but as her mother's story is gradually meted out throughout the novel it becomes a powerful exploration of how the past informs the present, and how secrets -- kept for good or ill -- can crack the foundation of relationships.

While I thoroughly enjoyed the idea behind The Clover House, and the gradual unfolding of the mystery surrounding Clio's life, I was struck over and over by the devastating lack of any sort of maturity or emotional health as exhibited by both Callie and her mother. Immaturity is more excusable of course in the chapters detailing Clio's childhood -- not only was she a teenager, eager for adult experiences, but her growing up was irrevocably changed by the advent of war -- a new norm that only those who lived like experiences could perhaps ever fully grasp. Callie, however, is another story entirely. I get that she had a terrible childhood and that she's been damaged by her parents' fighting and her mother's emotional distance. But when this novel opens she's about to turn thirty-five -- determined to destroy her boyfriend's attempts to build a future with her, getting upset when holes are discovered in her mother's DECADES OLD stories (hello, memory is not an exact science), and becoming petulant when others in her extended family don't share her obsession with their collective dysfunctional past and are more concerned with building reasonably happy lives in the present. I get that I can't (thankfully) relate to Callie's horribly skewed relationship with her mother, but what grates most is the immaturity and lack of any sense of personal responsibility for her own emotional health, for determining the trajectory of her own life, in a woman approaching her fourth decade.

Despite the fact that neither main character is particularly likable, The Clover House is a welcome addition to World War II-era fiction and a well-written, oft-times fascinating treatise on how the past, while gone, is never truly forgotten, its repercussions impacting the lives of generations to come. Power's narrative delves deeply into the richness of Callie's family heritage and provides a fascinating glimpse into Greek culture, particularly the importance of family ties in anchoring one's identity, critical in Callie's search for closure. I loved how Power intersperses the storyline with chapters from Clio's historical perspective, illuminating critical truths relative Callie's most recent discoveries. It's an effective narrative device, one I wouldn't mind seeing Power develop in subsequent novels but balanced by a protagonist who is at least marginally likable. While The Clover House didn't resonate with me quite as deeply as I'd hoped, it is nevertheless a richly-drawn and thought-provoking reading experience.

[Dorine · Rating 5 out of 5]

Also posted at my blog, TBR MOUNTAIN RANGE.

An imaginative novel that romanticizes Greek heritage while revealing a war-torn history that changed so many people's lives—you will be enamored by the heroine's zeal for finding her truth, no matter how much it hurts. Brilliant!

An absorbing novel, THE CLOVER HOUSE ventures between present day and 1940s World War II war-torn Greece, nostalgia dripping from every page. It's a journey of the human spirit, of the hope of belonging to one's self and to one's family history, no matter how sad it can be before the true joy of acceptance is realized.

Calliope "Callie" Notaris Brown spent many vacations as a child with her mother in Patras, Greece. Even though her mother married an American and lived in America during her married life, Greece will always be her home. Callie has listened to her mother's stories of her homeland, always wanting to fit in, but never feeling as if she is truly included in her mother's world.

Engaged to be married, Callie's fiancé, Jonah, is upset when she decides to go to Greece alone to settle her recently deceased uncle's affairs. Callie isn't even sure why she doesn't want Jonah there, anymore than why she hasn't been able to tell her family that she's engaged. She has always had a difficult time getting on well with her mother and the less complicated her own life, the easier it is to deal with her mother's habits. Callie's independent streak shines on each page of this novel. She's not always confident that her decisions are the right ones but she forges forward without permission from herself, often feeling reckless as she tries to understand where her life is going. Such is one of these times when she meets a young couple on the bus from the airport to Patras and forms a friendship that will weave in and out of her time in Greece.

THE CLOVER HOUSE is fascinating, pulling the reader through the present and the past while solving the ever-changing mystery of Callie's heritage page by page. The descriptions are effervescent, especially during Carnival, creating a world that Callie thought she knew but as revelations are discovered, she's not sure which of her mother's childhood memories are fantasy and what is shockingly the truth.

If you love history mixed with modern day, then you'll love how this novel propels its characters' stories forward by revealing clues in their past that have affected their present. Like any family grieving a loved one, questions are asked and sometimes the answers aren't expected or desired.

Callie not only grieves her uncle but also the life she thought she knew, becoming less and less sure of who she is, or where she's going. Will her uncle's clues lead her to the truth? Will Callie follow the hints or walk away? Is she brave enough to know the truth? An epic dive into what's best about women's fiction, author Henriette Lazaridis Power seamlessly guides the reader's fears and heart with her storytelling skills. Absolutely breathtaking!

Book and Review courtesy of Romance Junkies.

[Jackie · Rating 4 out of 5]

In The Clover House, Callie is made to come back to Greece after her cousin calls to inform her that her favorite uncle has died. This is unwelcome news on all fronts. She has not returned to Greece since she had a falling out with her mother five years prior. But, Callie feels the pull of familial obligation and of mystery. Her mother has always been cold to her but she is especially acting strange now that her uncle has left Callie all of his belongings. Callie is unsure about all this but to top things off she is having her own problems with her fiancée. Choosing to flee to Greece to uncover what her uncle wants her to she is also running from her problems at home. Upon her arriving she finds herself immersed in lives that have long passed and the stories she has always known are marred with truths long since past. Callie takes it upon herself to unravel these mysteries that may give her some understanding as to why her mother is the way she is and why she also is the way she is. What Callie discovers along the way will change not only her but her family.

This was a highly enjoyable read. I loved the mystery and the history of the book. Most of all I enjoyed the truth Callie finds then reading the real unmarred truth. The history of the Greek involvement in WWII and occupation through the eyes of a family that was impacted to severely was phenomenal. I am a huge history buff and to read a story such as this is wonderful. In a story such as this it was masterfully done to show that even during war children and teenagers still make mistakes. Only during this time they have much more far-reaching consequences. It wasn’t just the history of this story though. It was the cultural and familial structure that is shown so well. Clio and Callie’s relationship was still quite unknown by the end of the book, but I feel with the discoveries that Callie had she understood why she was the way she was. Her mother was always spoiled but she hid such darkened depths that only one other person knew. It is the complexities of family and how they mold your life that is very much illustrated. You can see that with Callie’s decisions with her own life and how her mother’s negligence disguised as leniency allowed Callie to be reckless. Overall, this is a fantastic book and if you like history, not only world but personal you will love The Clover House.

[Jolanda Kramer-Dijkstra · Rating 2 out of 5]

Vond het niet een heel sterk verhaal. Het greep me niet echt , maar heb het toch uitgelezen.
Het verhaal kwam ook erg langzaam op gang.
Pas op het eind werd het een beetje boeiend.

[June · Rating 2 out of 5]

I had a problem with this book and the two main characters Callie and her estranged mother Clio. The story takes place in NY and Greece, and when Callie travels to Greece because her beloved uncle died and left her the contents of his house, she tries to unravel the family secrets hidden since WW-2. Her mother had fled NY and returned to Greece after her husband died and tries to stop her daughter from delving into the past. She hardly speaks to her sisters and their children and Callie does not understand why the family does not speak to her mother, who is mean spirited and unlikeable.

Callie joins the Carnivale celebration before Lent, meets some wild friends, gets all dressed up in masks, has sex and drinks to excess, and wonders if she still loves the finance she left in NY.

I found a lot of the book boring, I disliked and couldn't relate to the characters, didn't enjoy the tradition of the Carnivale, which lasted many days, didn't understand many of the Greek words, and found out the family secret of what happened during the war fell flat!

[Michelle · Rating 5 out of 5]

THE CLOVER HOUSE by Henriette Lazaridis Power is a captivating tale of family secrets and the stories to be told by the things we save. It is about love and the choices we make.
Calliope Notaris Brown is called to Patras, Greece after the death of her dear uncle Nestor, her mother’s brother. She is told she has inherited her uncle’s belongings, including all of his strange collections. While trying to make sense of the photos, mementos, and family accounts of their life in Patras during World War II and the occupation by the Italians and Germans, Calliope unearths the secrets kept by her mother and her siblings. Calliope’s perceptions about her own heart and about her mother are different than she believed them to be.
THE CLOVER HOUSE was mesmerizing. A beautifully written debut, this could be one of the best books of 2013.

[Miriam · Rating 2 out of 5]

IF YOU WANT A REAL BOOK ABOUT THIS ERA IN GREECE, READ The House on Paradise Street by Sofka Zinovieff.
I disliked this book. I had no sympathy or involvement for any of the characters. In fact, I disliked Callie and didn't feel that anyone was sufficiently drawn to provide a full character. It was repetitive; the toggling back and forth between Clio and Callie often rehashed the same events without providing a different viewpoint so that technique failed. I kept reading because the author gives us the expectation of something momentous but falls short. Somehow, the book is like the main character: much ado about nothing. Her indulgence irritates me. It's a pity because the backdrop is rife with promise. It just doesn't work. And on top of alll that, the right-wing bias angered me. I could say a lot about this but I'll hold my tongue.

[Mary · Rating 5 out of 5]

This was a terrific book about how a person's history can affect everything, including their children's lives. This is the story of Calliope who finds out a beloved uncle has left her an inheritance which means she needs to travel to Greece. Their she discovers her family who they really are not just what she remembers from her summer trips. I enjoyed the characters, even more as I got deeper into the story. I haven't read a lot about what the war meant to those who lived in Greece and even less about their civil war but this book made me want to know more. Definitely an author I want to read more of.

[Brenna · Rating 3 out of 5]

Actually, 3 1/2 stars. The Clover House has Callie going through her uncle's things that she inherits and while in Greece, tries to find answers to family secrets. I liked the descriptions of Carnival in Patras, Greece in Callie's story, and I liked reading how WW II effected Greece during Clio's story. I do wish there was more of the past story from Clio's sisters. This is not a difficult read, and would make for a good book to bring on vacation, or on a quiet weekend.

[Kelley · Rating 4 out of 5]

I thought this was an engrossing story evoking both the ties that bind and the ties that strangle. And it's not often that we get to read *anything* that describes the less-well-known (well, anyway to me) parts of Europe during WWII and today. A hard to categorize story but definitely one worth reading...

[Becky Peterson · Rating 3 out of 5]

This seemed like a very long story

I’m not crazy about this book. The author took too long to get to the point of each of the lives she portrayed. The family drama and interlacing of family members, variations on the same history, and varied cultural inflections were good parts of the book. However I wanted to alternately shake or smack Callie to get some sense into her!

[Janall · Rating 2 out of 5]

Let me summarize- this is a book of family secrets, and how they can damage successive generations. Callie, a 32 year old Greek American goes back to Greece when her uncle leaves her the possessions of his house. Her mother Cleo does everything in her power to keep her from coming, including not telling her that her uncle ( mother’s brother) has died.
As a child, Callie and her mother visited Greece every summer and Callie became quite close to her mother’s 2 sisters, her uncle and her cousin. However, her mother was always a cold distant woman. Nothing has changed and nothing w the relationship is even more distant. Callie arrives at the Easter season and attend a series of parades, and festivals. Including one -a lustful masquerade where evidently everyone - including married people are encouraged to go out and seduce someone else. ???

Callie does alot of navel gazing, and digging in to what happened during the war while everyone tells her to leave it alone. but SHE HAS TO KNOW- to say this was dull, was an understatement - I wanted to scream “get on with it already. “


As Callie goes through her uncle’s things we learn that she has never learned to love, despite being engaged to a Boston hunk named Jonah. She treats him like crap, and under the guise of “ not being worthy of love”. I call BS. Callie is just as selfish as her mother.

SPOILER BELOW

Her mother Cleo was a selfish child, who became a selfish teen, which during WW2 cost the family their fortune, then gives up the name of a rebel to the Nazis to save her 13 year old brother- but also kinda to save herself.
Because of this she and her brother become outcasts in the family. Cleo never makes amends- instead she doubles down on her POV. Cleo is just a horrible person, a bitter judgmental arrogant woman. Callie also selfish- behaving terribly at her cousins home, and cheats on her fiancée with a rando she meets on a bus. Honestly, I was really rooting for her fiancée to dump her. I hated both of these women. The family is much better off without them.

[Kristina Cowan · Rating 3 out of 5]

As a Greek-American, I thoroughly appreciated this book's honest look at Greece just before the Occupation, and during. There's so much we still have to learn about that time. The author does a good job of shedding new light in that direction.

The scene-setting was also strong. I felt as if I were in Patras, and I have a good sense of the place--how it once was, how it is in the modern day.

There's also transformation--critical for any novel--in both the protagonist and the circumstances surrounding her. Yet Callie's transformation could've been stronger. Part of me yearned for her and her mother to share more emotion at the end. I wanted a deeper reconciling, deeper healing for them both. I didn't have a sense of healing, particularly not on Clio's part. Callie seems to be on the path toward healing. In the theatre of my reader's mind, I imagine Callie and Clio one day having a richer mother-daughter relationship, stronger for the trials they've endured.

And I wonder whether Jonah would've been so quick to forgive Callie for straying. Perhaps they would've eventually reunited, but not immediately. That he didn't challenge her on her behavior makes him appear weak.

I recognize how difficult it is to write a novel, and I appreciate all the research and effort the author invested in her debut book.

[Jada Caraballo · Rating 5 out of 5]

The Clover House is a novel that begins in modern day Boston, USA, about a woman Calliope Notaris Brown. In earlier years her mother implemented within their family the importance of visiting her extended Greek relatives in order to understand where she came from. However, as Calliope continued to grow up her, parent’s relationship fell apart due to her mother’s homesickness and dissatisfaction of America. As the years passed on, her relationship with her mother had become estranged and her connection to her Greek side was severely affected. Although Calliope avoided associating with her mother, it wasn’t until the death of her great Uncle Nestor and him leaving his possessions in her name to bring her back to Greece. My favorite part of the novel is when Calliope’s story shifts from America to Greece. The author creates a newfound mystery as Calliope begins discovering family secrets from Nestor’s belongings, revealing the events that lead to her mother’s chronic unhappiness and misery.

[Anne Cotton · Rating 4 out of 5]

I gave this book 4/5 because I learned a lot of 20th century Greek history and it began in Boston as did I but the author did not accomplish what I think she wanted to. While there is a direct link between our lives with our mothers (who they are as women) and our lives as adults specifically our love lives, Powers was trying to do more when she included her issues with her mother and where her mother came from or rather her history in Greece. Drawing her mother's childhood out was too much. The author wanted to include her latest visit and it finally be I would have liked to see her resolve her issues but instead she accepted what happened - which I have also but I didn't write a book which I hoped other people would read. Without going on the way the author did (!) she tried to do too much and would up with not much. She needed a better editor though the writing itself was fine. Powers needed someone with a red pencil with which she was very familiar apparently before she wrote this book. It was fun but not great.