Book Review
Title: Tiny Infinities
Author: J.H. Diehl
Genre: MG/Family/Mental Health
Rating: ****
Review: The opening chapter of Tiny Infinities was great, we are introduced to Alice a swimmer who is hiding at the pool to avoid seeing her father move out despite being aware the police are looking for her. On her way home, she sees a strange young girl walking alone and rescues her from being hit by a car, but she injures her hand in the process. We soon learn that the girls’ name is Piper and she moved in next door to Alice and that she obviously has some kind of mental disability.
We learn that Piper has some form of hearing loss as she doesn’t hear people and only certain sounds, but she also acts like a small child despite us assuming she is the same age as Alice who is nearly 13. We learn a lot about Alice’s home life and that she was extremely close to her dad until recently and her mom was injured in a car accident but has lingering problems. However, the highlight is Alice meets Harriet a new girl on her swim team and they get along really well, and I have a feeling they are going to be great friends.
As we approach the ¼ mark in the novel, Alice’s brothers are staying with her aunt and she is living in a tent in the yard with the mentality that she isn’t moving back in until her dad does. However, the money situation is bad, so she agrees to babysit Pipers younger brothers for some extra cashing her mother goes back to work. However, things in her life aren’t going the way she wants them to despite everything she is doing but she does have some positives she can focus on like Harriet and swimming.
As we cross the ¼ mark in the novel, it is clear to see that Alice doesn’t have a good relationship with either of her parents right now especially her father who she feels has chosen to abandon her which isn’t the case. Alice at times considers running away but her sense of loyalty to her father and duty to help her mother and her neighbours keeps her there but I do feel sorry for her. However, given that she is only a child she doesn’t really have a grasp on an adult relationship and the situation her parents are in. Despite this, she does find a bit of respite with babysitting Timmy, but she also helps with Piper as no one even her parents has managed to keep her attention for as long as Alice does. It seems to me that Piper is autistic or has something similar given her behaviour and mannerisms. Alice is also awoken to the fact that other families aren’t perfect either and that arguments seem to be commonplace with every family.
As we approach the halfway mark in the novel, I really liked how Alice and Harriet’s friendship was developing, it does seem forced, but it feels new and slightly awkward as new friendships do. However, Alice hasn’t seen much of her mother and she is spending a lot less time with her mother opting to spend her time babysitting or at the pool. She seems to be making huge strides with her babysitting job as she seems to be able to capture and momentarily focus Piper’s attention on certain games which a lot more than her parents can do. I think this is due to the fact that Piper’s mother had more than one child one of which is still a young toddler, so she can give her undivided attention to Piper and her father is a workaholic much like Harriet’s parents. I liked the developing relationship between Alice and Piper as the more time they spend together the more Alice is beginning to understand Piper and her condition and what it means to care for someone like Piper. The relationship between Piper and Alice develops further as she is able to get Piper to react to specific commands like stop and sleep, but she also gets Piper to talk which no one has been able to do in years.
As we cross into the second half of the novel, everything seems to be going great for Alice as she even gets Piper to talk but when she tries to tell Piper’s parents, they don’t believe her, and she gets into some serious trouble for this. All the while her mother is trying to force Alice to stay with her aunt like her brother and she isn’t considerate of Alice’s feeling about swimming. She doesn’t even care that Alice comes first in the relay meet and breaks to club’s record. I personally felt that Alice’s mother is so neglectful wrapped up in her own world so much so that it borders on abusive. Despite this and her strained friendship with Harriet, there are some silver linings and she is getting to grips with her crush on Owen. She isn’t even fazed when he tells her he has a girlfriend but despite that he still really likes her. Owen is one of the only people that Alice really opens up to about her life situation and he gives her some sound advice only developing the relationship between them further.
As we approach the ¾ mark in the novel, Owen and Alice come up with the plan to videotape Piper and get her to talk again so they have some evidence but everyone Alice has mentioned the plan to seems to think that it is a bad idea. However, there seem to be some forces at work not allowing Alice to give up on the girl that even her parents are beginning to lose hope with. In some ways, Piper and Alice’s situations are similar although Piper is ignored because she can’t communicate, while Alice talks yet no one seems to listen about what she really wants. Together with Harriet and Owen, Alice decides to continue their video experiment even after Alice’s parent force her to move in with her aunt after Harriet has to pull out of their big swimming meet. With only 40 pages left in the novel, I was torn as to whether this book would have a happy ending after everything the characters have been through.
As we cross into the final section of the novel, so much stuff happens which I don’t want to go into detail about, but it leads to Alice finding her feet in the world and finding her voice to actually tell her parents that she isn’t happy with their situation and for once they actually listen to her. We also see the bonds of friendship developed between the characters get stronger. While I was hoping for a romance between Alice and Owen which didn’t happen, I was still pleased about where their relationship ended up by the end of the novel.
Overall, this book is extremely character driven mainly focusing on Alice and her transition from childhood to adulthood mainly because of the decisions of the adults around her. I liked the realistic approach the responsibility, family issues and so many other aspects of this novel. While this isn’t in my typical genre of books that I like to read from, I sincerely enjoyed Tiny Infinities and I highly recommend you give it a go and it is short and easy to read but packs a real punch in the feelings department.
Buy it here:
Hardcover: amazon.co.uk amazon.com
Kindle Edition: amazon.co.uk amazon.com
I received this review copy from Abrams & Chronicle.
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