My rating: 5/5 stars

“How do you fight a thing that believes it owns you? How do you fight the past? With gold leaves & salt? With silence? With new earth beneath your feet? With the bodies, the hearts of others? With hearts that are tendered and bloodied but have thorns of their own. With the family that chooses you.”

The Inheritance of Orquidea Divina

Orquídea Divina is dying and she has asked her family to come and claim what is theirs. From the beginning of the book, it is clear that Orquídea is no ordinary woman. It is clear that she holds so much magic and power within her, and she will do anything to protect her family. The family in question though..they’re not too fond of each other, and have simply shown up out of obligation. They’ve come to collect and leave but this reunion will be the beginning of so much more.

The story alternates between the povs of Orquídea and her grandchildren (Ray, Marimar and Tatinelly.) When Orquídea narrates, we get to see her life as a young girl/woman, the events and people that shaped her into this ‘hard, lonely, ‘bitter’ woman she is described as today. When Ray, Marimar and Tatinelly narrate, we witness the growing awareness and mastery of their “gifts”, gifts Orquídea has clearly passed on to them.

This is a story about family and buried history. There’s something beautiful about a past you can only yearn for, a world so familiar but so out of reach. There is something magical about the resilience and the wisdom of our ancestors; the strange remedies of grandmothers and great grandmothers. There’s something so sacred about the stories they choose to pass on.

When I hear Orquídea say “protect your magic”, I hear “protect what makes you you”. To know who you are at your core is a different kind of love, is a different kind of peace. I loved seeing these characters come to understand what it means to be family; to understand what it means to be proud of where you come from, and to embrace your uniqueness. 

Long live Orquídea Divina.