The Children's House

by Alice Nelson

A love song to the idea of families in all their mysteries and complexities, their different configurations and the hope that creates them.
Marina and her husband, Jacob, were each born on a kibbutz in Israel. They meet years later at a university in California, when Jacob is a successful psychiatrist with a young son, Ben, from a disastrous marriage. The family moves to a brownstone in Harlem, formerly a convent inhabited by elderly nuns.

Outside the house one day Marina encounters Constance, a young refugee from Rwanda, and her toddler, Gabriel. Unmoored and devastated, Constance and Gabriel quickly come to depend on Marina; and her bond with the little boy intensifies. The pure, blinding love that it is possible to feel for children not our own is the thread that weaves through The Children's House.

When Marina learns some disturbing news about her long-disappeared mother, Gizela, she leaves New York in search of the loose ends of her life. As Christmas nears, her tight-knit, loving family, along with Constance and Gabriel, join Marina in her mother's former home, with a startling consequence, an act that will transform all of their lives forever.

Alice Nelson skilfully weaves together these shared stories about the terrible things humans are capable of into a beautifully told, hope-filled novel exploring the profound consolations that we can find in each other.

Genres: Fiction, Contemporary, Audiobook, Historical, Literary Fiction, War, Australia

260 pages, Kindle Edition

First published January 1, 2018

About the author

Alice Nelson is an Australian writer. Her first novel, The Last Sky, was shortlisted for The Australian/Vogel’s Literary Award, won the T.A.G. Hungerford Award and was shortlisted for the Australian Society of Authors’ Barbara Jefferis Award. She was named Best Young Australian Novelist of 2009 in the Sydney Morning Herald’s national awards program. Alice's new novel, The Children's House, will be published by Knopf Australia on 1 October 2018.

Awards
Sydney Morning Herald Best Young Novelist of the Year (Winner 2009)
Barbara Jefferis Award for Literature (Shortlisted 2009)
T.A.G. Hungerford Award (Winner 2006)
The Australian / Vogel Literary Award (Shortlisted 2004)

Reviews

[Amanda - Mrs B's Book Reviews · Rating 4 out of 5]

*https://mrsbbookreviews.wordpress.com
4.5 stars
It was an absolute pleasure to be introduced to the graceful storytelling of Alice Nelson. Her latest work of art, The Children’s House, is a touching rendition to the world of family, parenting, motherhood, connection and identity. This is a rousing tale that will refuse to leave you, despite the final page being turned over. In its own unique way, The Children’s House has so much to say about loss, trauma and love.

It was the title that first caught my eye when I requested The Children’s House to read and review. The title of the book holds much importance to the main characters of the book, Marina and Jacob. Both were raised in Israel, in a kibbutz arrangement. I haven’t heard this term thrown around since my high school sociology classes, which is where I was first introduced to this way of living. In a kibbutz, the children are cared for by the community, rather than their parents and siblings, in the idea that the child will eventually become a strong citizen of Israel. In The Children’s House, we meet kibbutz raised Marina and Jacob after they have moved to the US, settling in Harlem, where both hold successful jobs. Together, Jacob and Marina raise Jacob’s son Ben. One day in the eclectic Harlem, Marina has a fateful encounter with a young Rwandan mother, Constance and her son Gabriel. This marks the start of a powerful bond between the two very different women. This intense friendship serves to remind of us of how blood is not always the defining factor in gaining a sense of family. Alongside this touching narrative is a side story involving Marina’s background, her absent mother and some loose ends she must make amends with. Friendship, support and acceptance lead the way in this stirring tale.

One of Australian most respected novelists has provided a cover quote for The Children’s House, Brenda Walker states, ‘A full and wise creation of love and character by an expert storyteller’. I have to concur, this is a perfect statement to describe Alice Nelson’s latest labour of love. What struck me first about this book was not just the ambitious setting and principal subject matter, but the refined language. I did have to stop myself hurtling through this one at the top speed I normally read book. The Children’s House is a book set to a much slower beat. Once you have a handle on the rhythm, the experience is marvellous. The words, poetic and drifting, will resonate, even after you have put the book down. It is rare to find such an accomplished young writer, but Alice Nelson is a force to be reckoned with.

Some would say The Children’s House does deal with some dark themes and it does exude a certain sense of melancholy. However, it is juxtaposed by the messages of hope, acceptance and diversity. The book itself encompasses a wide range of narrative voices, alongside the main narrator Marina. This is a colourful tapestry of voices, each vibrant and begging to be heard. Nelson is an expert storyteller, weaving herself in and out of these stories. There is less focus on dialogue in this novel, which I found to be a refreshing change. This allows The Children’s House to focus much more on the important people and their various strenuous back stories. I enjoyed this different approach very much.

Nelson has cast a great lead in Marina. She reminds us of the positive aspects of humanity. She is understanding, accepting, full of love and the way she extends the hand of friendship to Constance, the Rwandan woman she meets by chance, was restorative. Likewise, Constance was a fully realised character. The character of Constance was vital to drawing my attention to the Rwandan genocide, which is sadly an area that I am largely ignorant about. Thanks to The Children’s House, I feel much better educated and aware of the Rwandan genocide, including its awful after effects. Although Alice Nelson is an Australian based writer, The Children’s House has a strong international flavour. This novel also expertly ties in the practices and customs of Marina, Jacob and their family who hail from Israel.

The sense of place is deeply realised is The Children’s House. I felt it immediately and I felt like I was walking the footpaths of Harlem, just like Marina. Nelson works hard to draw our awareness as a reader to her New York setting. Nelson engages all your senses as she describes the sights, sounds, smells and general happenings of day-to-day life in Harlem. A plane ticket to the US was certainly not needed, once I settled into the capable storytelling hands of Alice Nelson.

There are so many themes touched on by Alice Nelson in her remarkable new novel. The Children’s House offers a rich examination into kinship, motherhood, parentage, family, estrangement, abandonment, friendship and how we deal with extreme trauma. No matter the theme or journey covered, Alice Nelson aims to do this with insight and understated finesse. I feel grateful that I had the chance to explore the beauty The Children’s House has to offer, simply through its gentle commentary on the human spirit.

The Children’s House sets Alice Nelson apart as an author with a rare talent, who is able to compose a story that is deeply affective and representative of the complexities human nature. The Children’s House comes highly recommend and I am looking forward to meeting Alice Nelson next year at an author event in Perth.

*I wish to thank Penguin Books Australia for providing me with a free copy of this book for review purposes.

The Children’s House, is book #136 of the Australian Women Writers Challenge

[Dale Harcombe · Rating 3 out of 5]

ensitive and perceptive portrayal of two women from very different backgrounds. Marina was born and grew up originally on a kibbutz in Israel. Later In America, she meets Jacob who was also born on a kibbutz and his young son Ben. They marry and buy a brownstone to Harlem, a place that was formerly lived in by nuns and run as a shelter. They are unable to have children of their own. Then Marina meets Constance from Rwanda and her young son Gabriel. A bond springs up as Marina seeks to help Constance and comes to love Gabriel. What changes will that bring for their lives? And what will the information Marina learns about her mother Gizela mean for her life?
Setting is evocatively conveyed and character are interesting.
This is not an easy read. I admit to skimming through passages about the genocide in Rwanda because they were too graphic and painful to read. I also found the jumping around of time frame jarring as the story meanders around from one time to another.
While I still enjoyed it, I never really became emotionally invested with the characters. Always felt detached from them. An interesting read but not as good as I had hoped it would be.

[Theresa Smith · Rating 5 out of 5]

The Children’s House is a stunning novel, deeply moving and exquisitely written. Character driven, it is highly accessible literary fiction, a study in displacement and the lasting effects of severe trauma. The title of the novel refers to the place in an Israeli kibbutz where children live, so called, the Children’s House. Newborns are delivered there, from the time their mothers are released from hospital after giving birth, expected to live there with only one hour per day set aside for visiting with their parents. Siblings, if they are of the opposite sex, are separated. The idea is that the children belong to the nation, not their parents, and they can only grow into strong Jewish people for Israel if they are raised communally in the Children’s House. Marina, the main character in this novel, was born in a kibbutz, and along with her brother, spent her formative years in the Children’s House. The effects on her inform much of this novel, but it is the dysfunctional relationship she and her brother had with their mother after leaving the kibbutz that truly sets the stage.

‘It was not the way of the kibbutz. It was done for the sake of the children and the country. They were Sabras and they needed to be strong. None of this clinginess and fear. Even as a child, it had sounded like propaganda to Marina. A rehearsed socialist narrative. It was hard for her to imagine such a pragmatic coldness. But everyone on the kibbutz had come out of Europe. They had all been wrenched from the known world, where mothers tended their children and ordinary intimacies were possible. Perhaps their ability to love their children in the old ways had been scoured out of them, along with everything else.’

Gizela, Marina’s mother, had a devastating effect on her children. She was entirely disengaged, not just with them, but with life itself. She walked out of their life when Marina was seventeen, the day that Dov, Marina’s brother, committed suicide. This was no coincidence. The author skilfully explores the impact of the Holocaust on Gizela, specifically her displacement from Prague, a place wiped from existence and refashioned by the Soviets after the war. This was compounded by her exile from the kibbutz when her husband was killed, effectively displacing her once again. To me, Gizela was a husk of a person, moving through life like a shadow. The inter-generational effect of this was profound.

‘Dov believed it was the Children’s House which had made it impossible for Gizela to love them. That if she had cared for her own babies, had held them and fed them and rocked them to sleep, she would have loved them. Proximity, Dov believed, would have made things different…
…Marina thought of Constance. As far as she knew, Gabriel had been with her from the very beginning. She knew the sound of his cries, the weight of him against her back, the smell of his skin. And this had made no difference.’

Everything we learn about Marina, her mother, and her brother, is through reflection. Despite having her life in order, the dysfunction has had a lasting effect on Marina and weighs heavily. Much of it is triggered when she meets Constance, a survivor of the Rwandan genocide. She and her toddler son, Gabriel, are refugees. Marina meets them by accident, but becomes a part of their life with intent. There are strong parallels drawn between Constance and Gisela, as well as between Marina and Gabriel. Constance is an apathetic mother, disengaged with her son, and with everything around her. Just as Gizela moved through life as a shadow, so too does Constance. Marina is overcome with an urge to help Constance, but the more involved she becomes, the less it is about Constance and the more it is about Gabriel. In short, she falls in love with him; with his need for love. She recognises herself in him, sees herself as his saviour. With a now grown step-son, but no children of her own, Gabriel fills a void she is still young enough to feel.

‘She had heard Jacob speak once about the kind of foraging practised by orphans, or by the children of neglectful or abusive parents. Not for food or shelter, but for affection. For some scrap of sustaining emotion, some recognition. Small kindnesses they could make use of to right themselves in the world. She had done it herself, she realised.’

I loved Marina, I really did. She had such a terribly tragic time of it, and yet she set out with intent and made something worthwhile of her life, married a wonderful man, became a terrific step-mother. Successful in her career as an academic, despite doubting her skill as a teacher, she had my full admiration. I could completely understand the pull she felt when it came to Gabriel. The urge to protect, to nurture, to raise up and provide every opportunity for success. The urge to save a child as you had not been saved yourself. Marina was surrounded by her husband’s family, a collection of truly beautiful people. Her mother-in-law Rose was the polar opposite of Gizela. She and her husband had also lived on a kibbutz, but upon the birth of her child, Jacob (Marina’s husband), she fled, unable to contemplate handing her child over to the Children’s House. Rose was so giving, her heart so big and welcoming, as was Leah, her daughter. It was just so lovely to experience a character whose in-laws were wonderful, as opposed to irritating and overbearing, a common depiction.

Displacement is a key theme in this novel, not just for Gizela and Constance, but also for the order of nuns who sold the brownstone to Jacob and Marina. I loved how their experiences were woven into the story, but I’m not going to give anything away about that. Best you discover their reasons for being in the story for yourself. What struck my heart with this novel is how extreme trauma can break people, shatter them beyond repair. Some things can never be recovered. So it was for Constance, who loved her son, but had no ability to feel it, to act upon it. And so it was for Gizela too. It’s desperately sad, the things humans do to each other, how far-reaching trauma is, rippling down the generations, fracturing relationships beyond repair.

The Children’s House is beautifully written, with exquisite depth of feeling, vividly wrought. I loved this novel so much, became so invested in Marina’s life. I felt her tragedy and triumph keenly, I could relate to her on so many levels. This novel is not to be overlooked. Savour it, linger over the prose, immerse yourself in Marina’s life.

‘Impossible to fathom any of it. The distant sound of voices in the courtyard, the faraway hum of traffic, the catch and drip of the rain against the glass, the cooling cup of tea in front of her: the whole episode seemed suspended, out of time. She didn’t know how long she sat at her desk after she read the letter, her hands clasped around the mug on her desk to keep them from shaking, the tight twist of fear in her stomach. She laid her head down on the desk and closed her eyes.’


Thanks is extended to Penguin Random House Australia for providing me with a copy of The Children’s House for review.

[Lee Kofman · Rating 5 out of 5]

I was utterly taken by the intelligence and artistic beauty of this work! Nelson is an exquisite storyteller who enters her characters deeply, rendering each utterly unique. She also has the knack for thoughtfully engaging with tough moral questions and at the same time creating a taut, exciting narrative. Plus the thematic breadth of this novel is breathtaking; you can find an entire world there between the pages of this relatively slim book. I rarely get excited about contemporary fiction, but here is one book that did it for me.

[EmG ReadsDaily · Rating 4 out of 5]

A deeply moving love note to families in all their iterations, with all their complexities.

This story explores love, loss, displacement, trauma, and hope.

[Cass Moriarty · Rating 5 out of 5]

The Children’s House (Penguin Random House 2018) by Alice Nelson is an extraordinary rendering of family, place, the dynamics of relationships and most of all, the complex and intricate ties between parents and children – not only their own, but also the children of others. In beautiful, literary language, Nelson weaves together the stories of the main characters, traversing backwards and forwards in time, through memories, to capture something profound about the way in which families function, how they bind together and survive trauma and tragedies, and also to show the many ways in which they don’t survive, or at least the ways in which they fail – by fracturing into irreparable pieces, by disappointing those they are meant to love and support, by allowing circumstances to create obstacles too difficult to navigate, or by failing, somehow, to be enough of what others need them to be.
Set in Harlem, New York – a place of gentrification sitting side by side with the poverty of housing projects, much of the story takes place in the old brownstone building that used to be a convent full of nuns. But we also travel to Cape Cod and Narrowsburg – and each place is imbued with feeling as Nelson depicts the environment and the surroundings, the weather, the local flora and fauna, the unique atmosphere of each location. And whether we are in modern-day New York, wartime Europe or war-torn Africa, the exquisite writing transports us with all senses to that specific era.
We all know that families come in all shapes and sizes, and The Children’s House illustrates families in many forms. There is Marina, who grew up on a kibbutz in Israel with her beloved brother Dov, long gone, and her mother Gizela who has also long since disappeared from her life. Marina has made her life with Jacob, who coincidentally was also raised on a kibbutz. Their shared childhood experiences of being nurtured not by a nuclear family but communally raised by the carers in the kibbutz’s children’s house shadow their own life together with the unusual circumstances of their very first notions of family. Although Jacob’s extended family is very close, he is scarred by the desertion of his first wife, Leni, who left him and their only child years earlier when Ben (now a young man) was three years old. After an absence of three years, Leni returned sporadically to their lives, but the hurt has never quite healed. Marina has been a part of Ben’s life since he was ten but is constantly aware of the impact on him of that early maternal absence.
And into this dynamic comes Constance, a young Rwandan woman with a toddler, Gabriel, strapped to her back. They meet by chance on the side of the road, when Marina witnesses a disturbing incident between mother and child. Constance is quiet and watchful; the terrible, unknowable and unimaginable history of her experiences in Rwanda during the genocide remains unspoken. She seems so out of place in Marina’s Harlem, so utterly unequipped for the basic requirements of living, let alone mothering, and Marina is drawn to her in a compelling way that she cannot seem to control. Marina doesn’t understand if she is helping or hindering; if she is being exploited or being exploitative. Young Gabriel is mute and wide-eyed, more of an attachment than a child; not only does Constance seem barely able to survive each day herself, let alone care for a small child, but her pervading vibe is that she just doesn’t care. Despite – or perhaps because of – Marina’s own splintered family of origin, and also her concerns about Ben, she becomes inextricably linked to the fate of Constance and Gabriel, and tries desperately to bridge the cultural divide between them and her own life.
And there is another sort of family – a group of nuns gathered together from different convents, and now living in the one retained home, watched over by Sister Vera, herself now elderly, but the other remaining sisters even older, in their nineties, caring for each other while they wait patiently for their lives to come to an end.
So many variations on the theme of family; so many possible ways to love; such a rich and dynamic contemplation of the many permutations of familial bonds.
This is a story about the terrible wounding that parents can inflict on their children, and the great source of hurt that children can be for their parents; but it is also a story about the empowering love that can endure and prevail, a kind of deep, familial love, even amongst those who are not related by blood.

[Kate · Rating 5 out of 5]

4.5 Stars

This book carries power not only in the story but in the telling. The writing is sirenic, drawing you deeper into the damaged yet hopeful existence of Marina and those who she calls family.
The book explores concepts of family, love, childhood, nurture and the destructive power of war and ideologies - and how the damage ripples through the generations as a sense of loss.

An absolutely mesmerising read that is at once heartbreaking and inspiring.

[Lesley Moseley · Rating 2 out of 5]

2 1/2 maybe as I got sick f the trope of zigzag timelines and POV's... Skipped to the end and didn't feel I lost anything.

[Leanne Lovegrove · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is a beautiful book but it has left me with a deep sense of sadness that I cannot shake

[Daniel · Rating 5 out of 5]

I found The Children's House to be an exquisite, heart-wrenching novel that explores the complexities of loving a child not your own in the most authentic and powerful way. It is full of stories that interlock in a kind of tessellated pattern that feels inevitable and all the disparate strands are brought together beautifully. The aftermath of war, the struggle to reform the self in the face of great loss, the redemptions of love and the power of family are all themes that weave through the novel, although it is by no means only a tale of darkness and despair, despite some of the difficult material. The novel is set in the years after the Rwandan genocide and the interactions between Marina and the little refugee boy she comes to love are beautifully realised - there is so much loss and longing there that some of the scenes are viscerally painful. The complications of that love are subtly explored, as are issues about what our responsibilities are to each other. The ending is overwhelming and incredibly satisfying without neatly tying all the ends of the book together.

[Carol - Reading Writing and Riesling · Rating 5 out of 5]

My View:
Can a book both be intense and yet subtle? Can it be meditative yet urge you to take action? Can stories of displacement, war and war crimes, isolation and suicide have a more or less happy resolution? This highly complex yet very easy and engaging read broaches many contemporary issues in an eloquent and unassuming voice; this is accessible literary fiction at its best.

A fantastic read

[Jacquie Garton-Smith · Rating 5 out of 5]

The Children’s House is a haunting and lyrical novel covering important themes including belonging, parenting and what constitutes family with absolute respect. Bereft to finish this truly wonderful novel and no longer able to journey with the characters on the gentle tide of Alice’s exquisite prose - but will be reading it again to soak up more of the beauty. Favourite book of 2018.

[Lisa · Rating 4 out of 5]

The Children’s House is Alice Nelson’s third book: her first was a novel called The Last Sky (2008), which was followed by After This: Survivors of The Holocaust Speak (2015). I haven’t read The Last Sky, but based on its blurb and my reading of After This, (see my review) it seems to me that Nelson is drawn to the melancholy. She writes about exile, displacement, abandonment, loss and survival.

Just as After This chronicled the hope and healing of Holocaust survivors, The Children’s House concludes on an optimistic note. But what lies at the heart of the novel is the contrast between the helping professions and the power of love. The story is peopled by damaged characters: two children raised in the impersonal world of an Israeli kibbutz and then by a mother too remote to offer love; a boy scarred by his mother’s abandonment when new love took her to the other side of the Atlantic; a Rwandan refugee traumatised by rape and her sad little boy; and an elderly nun uprooted from her community as she cares for the other nuns dying around her. The unexpected irony of the characterisation is that one of the central characters is a child psychotherapist, specialising in traumatised children. Jacob is a good man —good-hearted as his mother says— an exiled prince who had succumbed to living in Harlem only because his wife wanted it, and a man who spends long hours helping children whose lives have run aground in some way or another. And yet, when his wife Marina is drawn into a relationship with refugees Constance and little Gabriel, Jacob discourages it. His care and concern is compartmentalised into working hours, and he has no faith in the power of love for healing.

Marina, who is childless after a decade of marriage, is an historian. She has written a successful book about the Romany, and is researching for a new book on Hasidic Jewry. She and Jacob have a quiet but loving marriage, depicted in lyrical detail. Marina, adrift after the death of her only brother and the disappearance of her mother, has been welcomed into the orbit of Jacob’s family: she has affectionate bonds with her mother-in-law Rose and Jacob’s sister Leah. Though she has no religion, the rituals of the Friday night family Shabbat ground her and they come together as a family at Christmas too. Everyone in that family accepts the presence of the implacably silent, withdrawn Constance and the unloved little boy, except for Jacob, who gravely tells Marina that she will damage him and that she is meeting her own needs, not the child’s.

This conflict between the protagonists is muted...

To read the rest of my review please visit https://anzlitlovers.com/2018/12/09/t...

[Dominique Wilson · Rating 4 out of 5]

The Children's House, by Alice Nelson [Penguin Random House, 2018] is an intelligent examination of both the effects of collective child rearing on an Israeli kibbutz, and the effect of war and trauma on mother/child relationships. It also investigates the good – and the harm – that one does when wanting to help another. There is psychological depth here – not only in the way Nelson explores each of her characters' psyche, but also in her recognition of the meaning, power and importance of silences. Nelson writes beautifully, and her characters are complex and captivating, each attempting to erase part of their history to make way for new lives but not quite succeeding, because the wounds are still too fresh. In a lesser writer's hands such topics could easily become depressing, but in Nelson's hands loss, longing, despair, exile and the fallibility of memory are thoughtfully dissected, then reassembled to create the poignant story of a family that, despite each member's vulnerability, is filled of love, support, and hope. The Children's House is a truly interesting book, and I will be looking out for more of Alice Nelson's work.

The only reason I am giving this book four stars instead of five is that I found the last chapter - the only one in the whole book written in the first person, in the present tense, and from Gabriel's point of view - somewhat jarring.

Thank you to Better Reading for this advance review copy.

[Maria · Rating 4 out of 5]

Honestly, it's probably a 5-star book. Especially for earnest book clubbers looking for a novel to fuel deep and rich discussion about any number of themes: motherhood, attachment, parental love, family, faith, refugees, grief and loss. I did enjoy the reading experience and picked this book up at every possible opportunity. The writing was fluid and accomplished and the stories rang and reverberated, enriched with wide and thorough research.

Totally my own loss but for some unfortunate reason I couldn't completely immerse in Marina's story. I held her at arm's length throughout the book. Like Jacob I was discomforted by her passionate attachment to a little boy who was not her own, despite his obvious need and his own mother's inability to provide. I am struggling to put my finger on exactly why I couldn't warm to her. I can offer no other solution to her dilemma and can absolutely understand her reasons.

I loved reading about Sr Vera and her flock and felt the loss when her story's thread was abandoned in the book. We hear from a little boy grown (an unexpected and beautiful ending), we learn the fate of one lost mother... what of the other? And I wanted more of the women who welcomed her into their fold in a whitewashed Winter.

Still, a masterful book and a thoroughly worthwhile reading experience.

[Jean Smith · Rating 4 out of 5]

Such a beautiful and sad story about a Jewish academic and her husband who have a very happy but childless marriage. They live in Harlem, New York amongst a variety of ethnic minorities. One day Marina sees a young refugee mother from Rwanda with her small child - they need help and Marina is drawn in to a relationship with them. She becomes totally besotted with the child and in return he with her. The story goes back and forth to Israel, England and New York. The Children’s House is relevant to the relationship that children have with their own parents and this is woven throughout the book. The novel leaves you with the understanding that none of us necessarily know the hardships that other people may have encountered and that the trauma of such experiences may never go away.

[Yonit · Rating 3 out of 5]

This book is called the Children's House, a reference to a kibbutz in Israel. Having lived for several years on a kibbutz, I felt somewhat offended by the implication that children who grow up on a kibbutz cannot have a strong bond with their parents. The various themes around parenting and dysfunction just didn't come together for me. I listened to the audiobook , narrated by an acclaimed Australian actress but I am sorry to say her reading detracted from the story, especially with the long list of words she mispronounced.

[Rebecca Altmann · Rating 4 out of 5]

This one jumps around a bit so can be difficult to follow.
The Children's House of the title refers to the communal living situation of children born on a kibbutz in Israel. They were separated from their parents shortly after birth and raised apart - like an orphanage or boarding school.
The book examines the effect of this on one family, but also other forms of abandonment and the way that affects the generation that follows.

Not an easy read, but it was a nice change of pace for me.

[Taneqa Rose · Rating 5 out of 5]

After hearing Alice Nelson talk about writing this book I knew I had to read it. I honestly loved this book. The intertwining stories of past, present and future was done extremely well, also having some chapters done by different characters points of view gave more perspective to the story. This book is going into one of my top reads.

[Jade Maree]

Will write a review after book club meets 😁

[Sheri · Rating 4 out of 5]

A beautifully written story with great composition and language. Although the author is Australian it has an international flavour.

[Kate Plaschke · Rating 4 out of 5]

A slow burn, but from around the half way mark I was sucked in and invested. Very insightful and covered such depth of knowledge it was a complex storyline, with beautiful scenes.

[Soph · Rating 5 out of 5]

4.5 stars

[Sam Still Reading · Rating 4 out of 5]

The Children’s House is a strong, character driven story that reveals the deepest emotions of its characters in a quietly powerful way. I wasn’t expecting the story to be as compelling as it was, but it sucked me in rather quickly! Alice Nelson has a way of drawing the reader into the world of her characters, seating you at the dinner table, in the study…wherever they go. The story discusses mothers in all forms – from those desperate to love to those who appear to be desperate to leave.

Marina, the main character, falls into the former category. She has been married to Jacob for many years, but they never had children of their own. Marina dotes on Jacob’s son Ben from his first disastrous marriage. Ben is now grown up and is undergoing a quiet rebellion of his own – away from college, stacking shelves and newly single. Both she and Jacob worry for Ben but accept that he must make his own decisions. Overall, the family is closely knit and supportive. Jacob and Marina were both born on a kibbutz in Israel, but his mother’s story of how they came to be there (and leave again) is completely different to that of Marina’s mother. Gizela was always a closed book to Marina and his brother. They know little of her history and spend their childhood trying to get to know their mother, who stubbornly refused. Gizela has been gone for years and it has left a question hanging in Marina’s life.

Marina is a good soul. She’s caring, interested and both notices and questions the world around her. So, it’s not surprising that Gabriel and his mother Constance come to her attention one day in the neighbourhood. Gabriel throws a tantrum, and Constance walks away. Marina swoops into rescue Gabriel and at that moment, a strange connection is established. Constance is from Rwanda and is likely to have suffered during the war. (She reveals very little). Gabriel is her son – but not. He feels foreign and not really hers. But it’s to Marina that Constance turns to when she needs help and soon Marina is heavily involved. Jacob thinks it’s all too much, but Marina can’t seem to let go. The juxtaposition of Marina wanting to give love and demonstrating it in comparison to Constance is striking. We never quite find out why she is so distant, although Marina researches to find out more about life in Rwanda in the 1990s. Yet cold as Constance is, you can’t hate her as a character. You can feel the something missing, the shock of a life turned upside down. Likewise, Marina doesn’t appear ‘goody-goody’ or desperate. She is aware she may be stepping over boundaries but makes a conscious decision to do so, whether that be with Constance or Ben.

Alice Nelson’s writing sings with skills. The nuances of characters are subtly written and realistic. They all feel fleshed out, flawed and alive. The stories of life of the kibbutz were an eye opener to me. I didn’t realise the ideologies involved or the grouping of the children into the one children’s house. It was rather shocking! These scenes also nicely reflected how Constance and one of the other characters, Alma, felt being in a foreign land. The excitement of the new and the scariness of the unknown…it all makes for an emotive, gripping read.

Thanks to Penguin for the copy. My review is honest.

http://samstillreading.wordpress.com

[Caren · Rating 4 out of 5]

Emerging from an undercurrent of trauma and the impact of exile is a story of love. Nelson's novel is beautifully written and deeply sensitive to the struggles of her characters to "belong to the places they are born", as "They don't have to go searching." The narrative focuses on searching to fit together the pieces of one's past into the landscape of one's present, often a journey of self-reflection, dramatic loss and pain. Yet, the novel is ultimately uplifting, exploring how families are created, not necessarily through bloodlines, but through opening oneself to the desperate need to love and to be loved.
The well-drawn characters are diverse, linked through Marina and her beloved husband, Jacob. They are protected and, to a large degree, healed through the love of Jacob's family and the ties to their Jewish heritage and traditions. Both of them had been born in Israel, on kibbutzim, where the existing rules of the time involved children living, not with their parents, but in a Children's House, where they had limited contact with their parents. (This practice was later discontinued in the movements of modern Israel.) In this scenario, the separation from her mother is seen critically as a crucial factor in constructing the distance between Marina and Gizela, her troubled mother. In contrast, Jacob's parents fled the kibbutz because of Rosa's rejection of such a separation. Pointedly, Marina's desperate need to be loved stems from her abandonment, emotionally and ultimately, physically, from her mother in the kibbutz and especially once they had moved to America.
There is a parallel drawn between Marina's "rejection" by her own mother and the worrying relationship between the Rwandan refugee Marina meets in Harlem and her young child. The bond that grows between the boy and Marina is both heart-warming and initially "dangerous", as Jacob tries to point out to his well-intentioned wife.
The Rwandan, Constance, is portrayed with depth and insight, revealing a young woman who carries with her the trauma of her past. Nelson tells us that "what we lose remains in us as a slow burn." And, so, there is again another parallel drawn between the impact of genocide in 1997, as Gabriel's mother was most probably raped by her attackers in her homeland, and the echoes of the Holocaust that victimised Jacob's family in Poland. This link is implied skilfully by Nelson, more as a note that the reader makes than an explicit reference.
There are several other "exiles" revealed that add to our compassion: the mystery that remains of how Marina's mother lived after having abandoned her children, the nuns who isolated themselves in rural Narrowsburg after vacating their Harlem convent, the sadness that consumed Marina's late brother, Dov. All of these are portrayed with elegance by Nelson, never painted with melodrama or excess.
This is an highly engaging read, the writing and stirring characterisations to be admired.

[Mandy Nunn · Rating 3 out of 5]

I actually checked my device to see if I had accidentally skipped to the end.
I kept waiting for it to really start & it finished. Don’t get me wrong it was a nice read but nothing memorable.

[Callum Macdonald · Rating 5 out of 5]

“So often consolation was unexpected; so often it came in a language not one’s own”.

The Children’s House is a deeply moving meditation on grief and identity, following the lives of Marina and her husband Jacob, each born on a Kibbutz in Israel: the ‘children of the Gods’. In the summer of 1997, Constance, a young Rwandan refugee, appears before Marina with her toddler, outside their Harlem brownstone. As their relationship grows, Marina is forced to consider the ways in which motherly love has the power to alter our identity in the most devastating ways. This was a wonderful read that delves into a range of stories, all coming together to create an incisive and elegant story.

I absolutely loved this book!

[Skadi · Rating 3 out of 5]

I listened to the audio book, read by Sarah Snook and while I quite like her as an actor, I found her reading of this a bit off-putting. Aside from this, The Children's House was a random choice for me. I found the writing to be slow, in a dreamlike sense and overall the story of love, belonging and connection was haunting. However, I did find it to be a bit tiresome at times, dragging it's feet between character POVs and timelines and ultimately quite sad. I was taken with the themes of the book but felt that overall it took itself a bit too seriously in a heavy literary style.

[R · Rating 2 out of 5]

Weirdly racist

[Vigdis Schmeding · Rating 4 out of 5]

Das Buch hat mein Leben bereichert.