The Salt In Our Blood - Ava Morgyn

 

The Salt In Our Blood follows the story of Catia, or Cat for short, after her grandmother, Moony, has died. Moony was Cat’s caretaker at that time because her mother, Mary, has bipolar disorder causing her to constantly fluctuate between depressive episodes and mania. Mary comes to take Catia to New Orleans where she begins to learn more about her family’s past, shedding light on everything around her. 

A big part of the book was about Catia discovering what exactly her family has been hiding from her, including a picture of Mary (Mom) holding a baby that Cat has never seen, the reason why Moony and Mary’s relationship was so strained, and the trigger for Mary’s first bipolar episode. The premise of the book was very interesting, and I was thoroughly invested in Cat’s journey. An issue that I did have was bringing mystical elements into this novel. I understand that it is New Orleans, and they are known for superstition, but I thought it was completely unnecessary for the story. The spirits that Cat encounters only brought more confusion, and it would have been better if they only appeared in her dreams instead of physically materializing to symbolize a “message” of death, hope, or some other representation that the author felt inclined to include. The author likely added the spirits to bring something interesting and unique, but the story’s main driving plot was already interesting enough and could stand well on its own. In fact, the spirits only made the story harder to follow as it confused me when I first started reading almost making me give up on this book.

I wish that The Salt In Our Blood was more focused on the journey of Catia figuring out what exactly is her family situation instead of talking about all the spirits, ghosts, and apparitions. In the first 100 pages, I thought the book was going to be about Cat’s gradual descent into madness as she starts seeing people from her dreams in the real world, but that isn’t what the book is about. Instead, they wasted a bunch of time building up occult knowledge without ever resolving it in the end. They never get explained about what their point in the story was. There was a lot of potential in this book if it was more focused on Catia and her mom coming to terms with everything that’s happened. Some points such as Mary and Gary's relationship or maybe even Catia at some point attempting therapy would have been interesting to delve into instead of focusing on superstitious reasoning. 

Overall this book did a wonderful job exploring the complicated feelings a person goes through when one of their loved ones is going through mental health struggles. There is a mix of hatred for them not being there for you when you needed it and guilt for feeling hatred because it’s not their fault. I feel like The Salt In Our Blood also did a good job exploring bipolar disorder, and they did so in a way that doesn’t paint it in a glorified way (*cough cough* tiktokers faking mental illness to be quirky) and instead, shows the hard truth of reality. The book definitely kept my attention as things started to get moving (the first 100 pages are kind of slow because of the unnecessary spirits).

I would definitely recommend this book as it is a heartfelt story. There are sensitive topics such as mental health and suicide, so be warned. I would give this book 4 out of 5 stars, but it could have been higher if the mystical wishy-washy elements were removed, and they instead focused more on the harsh reality.

-Jonathan Chen