Chapter One Hundred Fifty-Seven: The Weight of Feathers

As per a suggestion, I went ahead and read The Weight of Feathers, by Anna-Marie McLemore.  This recent YA novel follows two teenagers, Cluck Corbeau and Lace Paloma, who belong to rival families (think Romeo and Juliet).  Unlike Shakespeare's play, this story shares the narration between our two star-crossed protagonists, with the quotation in French (Cluck) or Spanish (Lace) informing the reader which character is narrating the chapter ahead.  At first The Weight of Feathers felt a bit too much like Romeo and Juliet for my taste, and each family's internal reinforcing of the evils wrought by the other family was a bit tiresome and obviously untrue or inaccurate.  However, as the story unfolded, it felt less like a modern remake of the play and more like an original story, becoming more nuanced and enjoyable.  I found myself really caring about both protagonists and wanting to find out what would happen to them; by the midpoint I could hardly put the book down.  However, I wasn't a huge fan of this story's version of magical realism (I might not like magical realism that much ever, actually).  I tend to prefer either realism or fantasy straight up, and I found the few magical aspects of this story somewhat distracting since they were unexplained (as they tend to be in works of magical realism).  Even so, I found this to be a compelling read, and if you like teen novels, or magical realism, or love stories, or award-winners (it was a finalist for the YA Morris Award for best debut author this year), then I'd recommend The Weight of Feathers.