Far From The Tree is an exquisite telling of how complex families actually are. From fights over dipping your fries in mayo to divorces and alcohol abuse, this book has it all. The novel follows three teenagers named Grace, Maya, and Joaquin, who have only recently found out that they are biological siblings. Each of them has individual hardships that they are dealing with, but on top of their everyday struggles, they are trying to make up for the bonding they missed over the last sixteen or so years. Although author Robin Benway focuses mainly on family issues, it is not your typical story about fake families who have fake problems that are solved at an unrealistic speed. It covers real topics that affect real people. Winner of the 2017 National Book Award for Young People's Literature and New York Times Bestseller, this book is bound to make you rethink what you take for granted and if you truly love your family enough.

       Right from the beginning, readers will be intrigued by the plot of the story, which immediately introduces a major conflict for each of the characters. Grace is pregnant at only sixteen, which has caused all of her friends to drift away and her parents to be ashamed to look at her. Maya’s parents continue to argue, ripping their family apart and causing Maya and her sister Lauren to fight as well. And Joaquin is struggling with foster care, because he will soon outgrow the system and doesn’t know if his foster parents, Mark and Linda, will adopt him. All of these problems are described in the first three chapters, each of which one sibling’s point of view. This technique brings the characters to life and works well within the story, giving an in depth look into how each sibling feels vs how they act. Not only is the plot interesting, but it’s unlike any book I’ve read before. Even the way Benway came up with the idea is creative. In an interview on PBS NewsHour she says, “It was actually a song lyric that inspired the very basic idea. … I heard a song while I was in a [Costco] parking lot, and I was just immediately like, this book is about adoption.”

       Normally a book with this many conflicts taking place at the same time would get disorganized, however Benway does an excellent job allowing the reader to follow the plot without difficulty. With so many characters’ lives being described at the same time it may also seem as if details would be skipped over just because there is only so many pages in the book. However, yet again, Benway miraculously manages to spend just enough time describing so that we can really see into each person’s lives but not too much, letting it become dull and lifeless. For example, Benway writes, “Maya’s room, as opposed to the rest of the house, looked like there had been an explosion at a color factory.” Each sentence is overflowing with detail, ensuring that no reader will become disinterested or want to put down the book. It also helps that Benway has created characters that have such contrasting personalities, generating a storyline where readers will not get bored easily.

       As the book continues, Grace, Maya, and Joaquin begin to accept that they are siblings, but the conflict still doesn’t die down. As relatives do, these three begin to argue with each other and suspense builds because while they are supposed to be bonding over the childhood they have missed, instead they are getting into disagreements. These arguments the characters have towards the beginning aren’t the only they will have and not by any means the most crucial. Despite their unimportance, they are believably depicted through the book because we see that their family isn’t perfect and don’t get along all the time. Benway writes, “Joaquin was new to having siblings, but he was pretty sure that making your little sister cry was at the top of the Do Not Do This Ever list.” This book doesn’t hesitate from the idea of sibling disputes, the same way it doesn’t shy away from big topics like teen pregnancy, divorce and adoption/foster care. Benway’s fantastic writing style works well in this type of story because she uses complex vocabulary and sentence structure that lead the book to be formal enough to be taken seriously, but also not so formal that teens can’t relate.

       This book had the potential to be a cheesy book where Grace, Maya, and Joaquin have a wonderful time reliving how their adolescence may have been, but instead it was turned in the opposite direction, giving a story with believable characters who portrayed an accurate representation of what it’s like to have siblings. Not only is the importance of family depicted through Far From the Tree, but we are taught the lesson that we should appreciate our families instead of taking them for granted. Over the course of the book, Grace, Maya, and Joaquin learn to value each other despite their flaws and understand how important their families are to them. Don't worry though, the book doesn’t end with a group hug on the beach under the stars.