Trail of Broken Wings

By: Sejal Badani

Narrated by: Karen Peakes

Goodreads Best Fiction Finalist and Amazon Charts and USA Today Bestseller

When her father falls into a coma, Indian American photographer Sonya reluctantly returns to the family she'd fled years before. Since she left home, Sonya has lived on the run, free of any ties, while her soft-spoken sister, Trisha, has created a perfect suburban life, and her ambitious sister, Marin, has built her own successful career. But as these women come together, their various methods of coping with a terrifying history can no longer hold their memories at bay.

Buried secrets rise to the surface as their father - the victim of humiliating racism and perpetrator of horrible violence - remains unconscious. As his condition worsens, the daughters and their mother wrestle with private hopes for his survival or death, as well as their own demons and buried secrets.

Told with forceful honesty, Trail of Broken Wings reveals the burden of shame and secrets, the toxicity of cruelty and aggression, and the exquisite, liberating power of speaking and owning truth.

©2015 Sejal Badani (P)2014 Brilliance Audio, all rights reserved.

Very dark

The narrator was good but it was hard to hear about abuse and the repercussions.

Beautifully written. Difficult subject matter

"Even though not every story ends with a happy ending or begins with tragedy, along the way there are moments of both. And those moments don’t define you or even break you— they are simply parts of the whole.” A family’s secrets, individual and collective, rise to the surface as a mother and her three adult daughters gather together during the final days of their husband/father’s life. As they recall the early years of their family their memories of abuse, violence, anger and favoritism rise to the surface. Front and center in these memories are feelings of anger at their controlling and abusive father and their mother’s reluctance to stand up for them or contradict their father. The mother, herself a victim, and her daughters must make peace with their memories and come to understand their father’s own truths and struggles. “What he did to you can never be undone. But don’t let it color your life. Don’t let his actions or his way of living become your truth.”

Each daughter speaks to the reader as she explains her version of the lies and violence of her childhood. Each has since developed her own way of coping with their memories. As adults, the 3 daughters have made very different lives for themselves. One has become a traditional wife and mother. One is very successful. One left home and never looked back. Now, as they gather with their mother they must learn to be a family once again. Still, it is difficult to be angry with a man who is on his deathbed. We don’t choose our families, or our childhood, but we choose our future.”

As difficult as the subject matter can be, the book is beautifully written, a very touching story.
⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
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Really captured my interest

This story drives deep into waters I am unfamiliar with. It tells a story of the dichotomy between what we know of people in our lives and the potential subtext of their experiences.

it makes realize to consider that I don't really know why someone may react to certain situations one way or another. The key is to open up and share... it's the hardest thing sometimes, but the greatest gift... for all.

excellent

I loved this book and will recommend it it to all who have had some form of abuse.amuse is not always physical in nature--words can be scary and hurtful for years also, but less likely to be talked about less likely therefore to be solved.

Abuse and Its Casualties

This is a honest and hard look at the aftermath of domestic abuse. Each character has constructed a facade to protect themselves from their past. It's also a peek into the cultural norms that keep the family imprisoned.