Review of Kalayla

[Mehak_mattoo6]

[Following is a volunteer review of "Kalayla" by Jeannie Nicholas.]

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4 out of 4 stars

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Kalayla, a truly beautifully written story by Jeanie Nicholas revolves around a half-white and half-black old girl who does not have a normal, simple life like other 10-year-olds. A simply outspoken child with a single-white mother who works almost every hour of the day to provide for her daughter after her husband died. Both of them live in a small apartment building owned by a 72-year-old lady, Mrs.Lena, who couldn't help but worry about Kalayla given the fact that she is different from the other kids and tries to keep her busy to keep her out of trouble on account of her antisocial attitude, her sense of style, or her sharp tongue that could get her in big trouble anytime.

A lady with a horrible past, a 72-old woman who has not heard from her sons for 15 years, a strong-willed girl who has been lied to so many times, who no longer believes anything. The story revolves around these three strong-hearted women who didn't have any manly support and fought their way through life.

Kayla is truly a story that strongly believes in the fact that people can change and can surprise you in ways that you never thought they could if you give them time. I truly loved the fact that the writer has put forward the fact that people can get so judgemental about everyone without even knowing their side of the story, but when they do get to know it, they can finally understand why something happened the way they it did. It truly changed my perspective.

Sometimes, I found the story unnecessarily long while showing the story from everyone's perspective as it makes people skip lines. I would also suggest that there should have been been a list of characters at the start of the book to make it easier for the readers to keep track of everyone as some characters have unisexual names.

I would rate this book 4 out 4 because it made me tear up while getting to know every character's back story and made my feelings for each character change completely at the end. It even gave me a warm fuzzy feeling whilst reading from Kalayla's child's perspective.

I would recommend this book to those who loved 'It ends with us' and who love unfolding people's dark past and just to everyone because this is a kind of book that needs to get out there.

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Kalayla
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