The Turner House by Angela Flournoy

The Turner House by Angela Flournoy

                The Turner family has owned the house on Yarrow for decades. Cha-Cha was seven when they moved in and all of the thirteen Turner children grew up within those walls. But it’s been a while since Francis, the patriarch of the Turner family, has passed. Viola, the matriarch well into her eighties, now lives in Cha-Cha’s home and the Yarrow house has been abandoned. Furniture “borrowed” by different family members has left most of the house bare. The “Big Room” where all of the children have once called their own, and where Cha-Cha, once fought a haunt has nothing but a twin bed and bare walls. What to do with the house that holds their memories when it is worth nothing more than the past it holds?

                The Turner House is a really well written novel that centers around what it means to be a family, to struggle with addiction, to contemplate ghosts and to move toward the present. Flournoy did an amazing job flushing out her main characters and in doing so, allowing us to appreciate not only the scope of this large family, but how complicated it can be to manage. Maintaining relationships isn’t easy and yet you love your family and people are flawed. Learning to accept people for who they are is a constant struggle as is dealing with past indignities. I loved that this book dealt with all of these issues and continued to draw back on how the story began with Viola and Francis.

                I am recommending this novel. It was easy to read and touched on so many different aspects of life. Flournoy did a great job of making this novel feel genuine. I could recognize some of these characters from people I’ve met and loved in my own life. I also appreciated how Flournoy discussed Detroit and its racial and poverty-stricken background. The house became its own characters and in doing so it revealed its own history. I give this book 4 out of 5 stars. Well worth the read.