Books like The Roots of the Olive Tree

The description of the book - a story surrounding five living generations of women - appealed on that very women’s fiction level. The synopsis hinted at hidden secrets along with this very interesting family dynamic that brings all five of these women back under the same Californian roof. Santo broke her narrative into five sections - one section for each generation’s P.O.V. - plus a bonus epilogue from the perspective of the sixth generation. Unfortunately, the secrets revealed came surprisingly early in the book. The largest downfall, however, was the ending - nothing resolved, and the epilogue raised more questions than it answered! Of the characters introduced, only two have reached actual conclusions by the end of the book - none of the other characters came close to reaching any sort of resolution. And a large event planned for towards the end and its lack of follow-through was particularly frustrating.The issue of longevity here played an interesting theme. But for those at all familiar with genetics, the longevity here is played more like magic than science. Though this is definitely fiction, it would have felt like a more authentic story if Santo had left the science alone. The scrambled explanation about the longevity being gender-specific doesn’t actually work... If this mutation is passed along the sex chromosomes, it would be the X-chromosome in particular, but women have two X’s, so it would be more, not less likely, for the males to display the longevity as they have only X-chromosome and would not have a “compensating” X. Either let the longevity be a function of fiction and work as magical realism, or research genetics. I just couldn’t suspend disbelief the way the “facts” were presented here.