Name: Gingerbread
Rating: 3.340909090909091 (44 reviews)
ISBN: 9781984882899

Helen Oyeyemi

"The prize-winning, bestselling author of Boy, Snow, Bird and What Is Not Yours Is Not Yours returns with a bewitching and inventive novel."--

Gingerbread

Shoob 🧸

Harriet could stomach any mess, but she was Margot-sick. The symptoms were various and sometimes debilitating; tearfulness, being intensely critical of people for not laughing the way Margot did or hugging her the way Margot did or interrupting people mid-story in order to predict what they were going to say next with a fifty-fifty success rate the way Margot did. There was also a lot of desultory raising and dropping of the arms, as if seeking a hold, as if the whole lopsided world was just a badly hung picture frame she could tilt back into balance. 

A Novel

MY FAVORITE BOOKKKKKKK!!!! I’m obsessed with Helen Oyeyemi and her weird worlds. If I could only read one book over and over for the rest of my life I would pick this one. 

Molly M

you have to give in to the twisting convoluted nature and then it’s a darling fairy tale

what the fudge! this book didn’t make sense to me I wish it did

Ruby Emmeline Fisher

Rachel Kanyid

Honestly could not follow this story very well at all. The story idea was interesting, but I just kept getting lost along the way with the story.

Like most of the author’s works, you need to go along for the ride. Fun and satisfying, a fairy tale. My only complaint is I’m not sure it sticks the landing as well as I would have wanted.

Becky Carpenter

Mahogany Skillings

Magical gingerbread, living dolls, chance meetings and a country that exists on no maps are just the icing on this book. Magical realism weaves its way through the story and catapults you into a version of our world, just this side of weird. Gingerbread is a circle with a questioning future at the end. Harriet Lee, Perdita Lee, and Margot Lee make up the main characters for a time, but every other character has a part to play in this tale even when it isn’t clear up front. As good, bad, and unsure things happen with Harriet and her family – the gingerbread is a constant. You’ll end this tale satisfied, but wondering what else could and/or will happen and when.

Renee Blankenship

Ohhhhh Helen Oyeyemi, what is not to love? I had been eagerly anticipating Gingerbread since the Fall and was so excited to get a copy from Riverhead Books! Thank you!

When I start reading a book by Oyeyemi, I know it will be unexpected and I anticipate a weird and slightly strange story. Gingerbread did not disappoint! It is truly a unique book with nods to classic fairytales abounding. Oyeyemi has the ability to turn a phrase or write a description that will make you go back and reread because you swear you read it wrong. Are the vines on the curtains really growing at nightfall? Do the dolls actually have living plants growing in their chest? And they are talking, yes? This is what I love most about any story Oyeyemi writes, nothing is as it seems and a simple sentence can turn the scene you had pictured in your head upside down. 

Parts of this story, about half way through, I had trouble keeping up with. Mostly when a lot of new characters were introduced. I had a hard time keeping everyone and their relationships to each other straight at first. I feel like this section of the story was a bit too slow for me and then all of a sudden it picked up again towards the end. I actually reread the last few chapters to make sure I grasped what was happening with the three houses and Gretel. 

Am I sure I know who Gretel is, now that I've finished the story? No. Do I understand her purpose? No. Were the two girls in the photos actually Gretel and Harriet in some future or past time? I do not know. AND I LOVE THAT I HAVE THESE QUESTIONS. I really do. I could reread this book and probably pick up answers and also have ten more questions. 

Helen Oyeyemi writes the kind of stories we don't see often and it is always such a joy reading them.

‘A writer of sentences so elegant that they gleam’ - Ali Smith Perdita Lee and her mother Harriet may appear your average schoolgirl and working mother but they are anything but. For one thing, their home is a gold-painted seventh-floor flat with some surprisingly verbal vegetation. And then there's the gingerbread. As we follow the Lees through encounters with jealousy, ambition, family grudges, work and wealth, gingerbread seems to be the one thing that holds a constant value . . . Influenced by the mysterious place gingerbread holds in classic children's stories - equal parts wholesome and uncanny - beloved novelist Helen Oyeyemi invites readers into a delightful tale of a surprising family legacy, in which the inheritance is a recipe. Endlessly surprising and satisfying, written with Helen Oyeyemi's inimitable style and imagination, Gingerbread is a true feast for the reader.

Gingerbread

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