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Reviewed by Carol Thompson for Readers' Favorite
Domnica Rădulescu’s My Father’s Orchards is a multi-layered historical novel that masterfully blends memory, trauma, folklore, and political critique through an intensely personal lens. Told through the voice of Corina Angelescu, a Romanian-American woman who returns to her homeland in 2015, the novel excavates the buried secrets of her family’s past, threading them with Romania’s turbulent 20th-century history. The story is a meditation on loss and legacy, woven around the symbol of a once-lush orchard now nearly erased. Rădulescu’s lyrical prose transports the reader across time, from Corina’s father’s harrowing wartime adolescence in 1944 Northern Moldavia to Corina’s disorienting return decades later. Identical twins Zoe and Caroline’s absence provides a quiet but powerful undercurrent.
Domnica Rădulescu draws vivid portraits of her characters, especially Corina’s father, whose bittersweet recollections are saturated with both love and anguish. From a hidden pantry sheltering him from Russian soldiers to his surreal encounters with a spectral “strigoi” girl, the father's memories evoke a haunting blend of realism and folklore. Meanwhile, Corina’s present-day journey is filled with poignant ironies and poetic moments, such as being accused of espionage while retracing her family roots and finding the remnants of the orchard not in official records, but in a neighbor’s backyard. What elevates the novel is its exquisite language. Rădulescu writes with emotional clarity and sensory richness. The orchard is a metaphor for generational endurance, cultural displacement, and the ineffable pull of home. My Father’s Orchards is a powerful story about the enduring spirit of those shaped by exile, survival, and love. If you only have time to read one book this year, read this.
