Clap When You Land Book Review

Title: Clap When You Land
Author: Elizabeth Acevedo
Type: Fiction
Published: 2020
Pages: 417
TW: Death, Airplane Crash, Sexual Assault

“it has saved my life on the many days
when I need a reminder that the world is bigger
than the one I know, & its currents are always moving;
when I need a reminder
there is life for me beyond the water
& that one day I will not be left behind.”

Clap When You Land is set in both the Dominican Republic and the USA. When a tragic plane crash occurs and leaves no survivors, what one of the victims leaves behind in his wake is both messy and complicated. His daughter in the DR, Camino, mourns his loss and comes to terms with the fact she is now an orphan. Dreaming of going to the USA to study so she may become a doctor now seems less likely than ever. Over in New York, Yahaira is also mourning the loss of her father – a father whom she leant secrets about just before the crash. Little do they both know that they share more than a tragic event, they share the very same father too, and now in finding each other they may be able to pull some light out of the bleakness he left behind.

This book sort of scared me; I’ve never read a novel written in verse before and I was apprehensive about whether I would understand it, let alone like it. So I’m happy to report that I was almost instantly won over by the beauty of it all! While reading, I honestly forgot it wasn’t prose – Acevedo is an absolute master at writing in this style and the beautiful verses made it all the more compelling and emotional for me.

Acevedo does a fantastic job of carving out Camino and Yahaira as very separate people with contrasting personalities (you can’t help but feel they probably wouldn’t be friends if they weren’t related) but throughout there’s this invisible tie, holding them together and as a reader, you feel the author gently pulling at it, and ultimately, pulling them together. What’s most poignant about their few similarities is the way they are both able to share the betrayal of being violated by men. At first, neither thinks the other could possible understand their situations, but as a reader we know that despite living thousands of miles away from each other, their experience of how men have treated them is chillingly similar.

Obviously grief is a huge theme in this book and the way both girls deal with the death of their father is a heart-breaking thing to witness. I found it particularly emotional when Camino expressed her frustration that her dad was such a good swimmer and yet he died in the sea – her hope that they may yet find evidence he is alive made this all the more saddening.

Two lives invisibly entwined, this book tells a story riddled with tragedy and pain, but through Camino & Yahaira, a new perspective is also shown – one of hope. Both start quiet rebellions, whether through Camino’s desire for an American education to become a doctor or Yahaira’s sexuality and the comfort she finds in her girlfriend, both know the pain of fighting against the life someone else has made for you. And both find strength despite the tragedy which has occurred. I very much look forward to reading more from Elizabeth Acevedo!