This book had Greek culture deeply woven into all of its stories and words. I truly felt transported while I was reading it.. The descriptions of the homes, the tendencies and vernacular of the people, and the lives they led were all so very present. And even though we did not necessarily get to know each narrator/family/person in depth (that was bound to happen given that these are short stories), the stories managed to be pretty intricate nonetheless. By the time I had read about 4 stories, I felt like I already knew more about those villages and their customs. The settings were just so well done in my opinion. And each story had a bit of drama in it that kept me invested.

The language was rough and broken at times, which did make it feel sort of amateur. The writing style of the plot was not my favorite. As a whole body of work the writing was good because it made me feel connected. But each story individually, and the words themselves sometimes didn't flow right..

So basically, while the villages and people all felt like part of a larger community that I was learning about, the delivery of each story seemed to not be fully polished. While I was sympathetic to the plights of the women in these stories, for example, I think the writing was choppy and at times the focus of it left me feeling like the parts of the main character we saw a glimpse of were enough or were the wrong glimpses.

This was still a good book though, and I would recommend it to readers of contemporary fiction looking to genuinely learn a bit about a different place of the world.