The Five Wounds: A Novel
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4.1 • 67 Ratings
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- $13.99
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- $13.99
Publisher Description
Winner of the 2021 Center for Fiction First Novel Prize
Winner of the 2022 Rosenthal Family Foundation Award
Finalist for the 2022 Andrew Carnegie Medal for Excellence in Fiction • Finalist for the 2022 PEN/Hemingway Award for Debut Novel • Finalist for the 2022 Aspen Words Literary Prize • Finalist for the 2022 Lambda Literary Award for Lesbian Fiction • Finalist for the 2022 Mark Twain American Voice in Literature Award
One of NPR's Best Books of the Year • A Publishers Weekly and Library Journal Best Book of the Year in Fiction • A Kirkus Reviews Best Fictional Family of the Year • A Booklist Top Ten Book-Group Book of the Year and Top Twenty-First Century First Novels, So Far • A Goodreads Choice Awards Best Debut Novel Nominee
From an award-winning storyteller comes a stunning debut novel about a New Mexican family’s extraordinary year of love and sacrifice.
"Masterly…Quade has created a world bristling with compassion and humanity. The characters and the challenges they face are wholly realized and moving; their journeys span a wide spectrum of emotion and it is impossible not to root for [them]." —Alexandra Chang, New York Times Book Review
It’s Holy Week in the small town of Las Penas, New Mexico, and thirty-three-year-old unemployed Amadeo Padilla has been given the part of Jesus in the Good Friday procession. He is preparing feverishly for this role when his fifteen-year-old daughter Angel shows up pregnant on his doorstep and disrupts his plans for personal redemption. With weeks to go until her due date, tough, ebullient Angel has fled her mother’s house, setting her life on a startling new path.
Vivid, tender, funny, and beautifully rendered, The Five Wounds spans the baby’s first year as five generations of the Padilla family converge: Amadeo’s mother, Yolanda, reeling from a recent discovery; Angel’s mother, Marissa, whom Angel isn’t speaking to; and disapproving Tíve, Yolanda’s uncle and keeper of the family’s history. Each brings expectations that Amadeo, who often solves his problems with a beer in his hand, doesn’t think he can live up to.
The Five Wounds is a miraculous debut novel from a writer whose stories have been hailed as “legitimate masterpieces” (New York Times). Kirstin Valdez Quade conjures characters that will linger long after the final page, bringing to life their struggles to parent children they may not be equipped to save.
APPLE BOOKS REVIEW
Gritty and ambitious, this debut novel digs deep to find the love that binds a troubled family. Amadeo Padilla is already struggling with his beliefs when his faith is tested in a whole new way. After a fight with her mom, Amadeo’s estranged 15-year-old daughter Angel shows up nine months pregnant. The absentee grandfather-to-be hopes that Angel’s baby will bring his disjointed family back together—and we get to know each member of the clan during the baby’s first year. Throughout this remarkable book, author Kirstin Valdez Quade beautifully captures the backdrops and landscapes of small-town New Mexico, from lonely piñon trees to ramshackle churches built in old gas stations. With poetic grace, she navigates challenging issues like violence, betrayal, and substance abuse. The Five Wounds is an honest portrait of a family’s pain and a hopeful vision of their future.
Customer Reviews
3.5 stars
This book took me a lot longer than usual to finish. I suppose that it’s harder for me to read when I am going through my own trials & tribulations in my personal life. So unfortunately, I was unable to enjoy this book as much as if I didn’t have my own stuff going on. For whatever reason though, I just couldn’t get into it. I felt that some of it could have been left out. I really hated all of the characters pretty much, and by the end- I did like them all. If you like this book, you’d probably also like the book “Family Lore,” too.
Lackluster ending. Could be a Lifetime movie
Disappointing