If you are reading this book with the idea that it a memoir, you will be half right. The author was certainly invested in researching her family tree. Her curiosity and self-deprecation about what she finds allows the reader to empathize and become invested as well. Crazy, racist parents grandparents, or uncles? Yep - we all have someone just like them in our trees and share the awkward, uncomfortable feelings that come from trying to reconcile childhood feelings of love and loyalty with adult understandings of unacceptable behavior and belief.

But just when you are really with this author on her journey to figure out just how many wives DID grandpaw have or another of the thorny questions her family tree posed, you mentally hear that ***eeerrerkkk*** sound of a needle scratching across a record and you are off into the weeds of epigenetics or ancestor worship. Wait, what? You say... when did I sign up for that? And the answer is you didn't - because the book's title and blub give you no idea that in order to follow "Maud's" journey up and down her family tree you're going to have to endure multiple chapters of dense lecture-like material about questionable applications of cutting edge gene science mixed with pseudo-religious mumbo-jumbo.

I am left uncertain about her intentions regarding her people. She clearly condemns the bigoted, racist actions of many of her relations but then highlights herself engaging in odd white-lady feel-good symbolism that does little to address the legacy of those actions in the present. I'm left feeling like hey - maybe rather than reciting a poem or lighting a candle - whilst calling forth your ancestral spirit guide, join a social justice organization and advocate for meaningful change.

I liked it but I wouldn't read it again or recommend it.