Belong To Me by Marisa de los Santos

Please note that this is a secular title.

If you didn’t know your biological father, would you search for him so that you could meet him? That’s one of the story threads in this book.

I enjoyed reading this book, to a certain extent. I’m not sure if this is classified as literary fiction. It was written in a way that I’m not used to reading.

Cornelia and her husband Teo relocate from the city to a small town. She’s currently not working and her husband is a doctor – an extremely good-looking doctor – a fact that the female neighbors notice immediately. I had a hard time liking some of the characters in their new town. It appeared that they were concerned about liking/disliking people at the drop of a hat – some of their conceptions based upon the way a person looked or dressed. For example, Piper, one of Cornelia’s neighbors, initially doesn’t like Cornelia because of her short, petite stature and her choice of dress for a welcome-to-the neighborhood party. Also, the neighborhood women seemed to have too much time on their hands – none of them worked full-time, and it appeared they were more concerned about appearances and who was doing/saying what in their neighborhood moreso than running their household and raising their children, or minding their own business.

You also have Elizabeth, Piper’s best friend who is dying of cancer. Piper takes care of Elizabeth, placing her own health and family on the back burner so that she can minister to her friend. When you see Piper caring for her friend, she doesn’t seem to be so cold-hearted, which endeared me to the story a little bit.

Cornelia and Teo are childless, a fact that bothers Cornelia. They “mentor” a thirteen-year-old girl, Clare, who is like a daughter to them. Cornelia is also befriended by Lake, the mother of a thirteen-year-old genius boy named Dev. Lake has also recently moved to the area so that Dev can attend a school for highly-intelligent children.

As the story unfolds, you discover Lake’s real reason for moving to the area. You also see a deep friendship form between Dev and Clare.  Dev has always wondered about his father, so Dev and Clare “play detective” and search for Dev’s dad, hoping to clear up Dev’s questions about his parentage.

Dev also befriends two kids at his new school, one of his new friends, a girl named Lyssa, has serious mental and emotional problems and he supports her during her difficult times. Dev is also befriended by his school mate Aiden, and they go into business together raking leaves.

This book was not written in a simple, straight-forward manner – which is why I had mixed feelings about the writing style. The story would often go off on a tangent, giving paragraphs of background detail, before getting to the point at hand. I found this style a bit bothersome since I’m not used to reading books written like this. The story itself was mesmerizing, however, it does have a little bit of graphic language.

So, if you didn’t know your biological father, would you search for him so that you could meet him, like Dev did in this book?

Have you read this book, if so, what’d you think about it?

~Cecelia Dowdy~