{"id":46742,"date":"2026-07-27T20:52:41","date_gmt":"2026-07-28T00:52:41","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/sonderbooks.com\/blog\/?p=46742"},"modified":"2026-07-27T20:52:41","modified_gmt":"2026-07-28T00:52:41","slug":"review-of-together-we-see-by-ari-tison","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/sonderbooks.com\/blog\/?p=46742","title":{"rendered":"Review of Together We See, by Ari Tison"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/a>Together We See<\/em><\/p>\n

by Ari Tison<\/p>\n

Farrar Straus Giroux, 2026. 310 pages.
\nReview written July 24, 2026, from my own copy, sent to me by the publisher.
\nStarred Review<\/p>\n

I suspect the publisher sent me Ari Tison’s new book because I was on the 2024 Morris Award Committee that chose her debut novel, Saints of the Household<\/a><\/em>, as a finalist, and they knew I’d love it. They were right. I was already a huge fan of Ari Tison’s work, and I think she’s gotten even better with her second novel.<\/p>\n

Ul\u00e1 lives with her mother in Wisconsin, making plans for after high school. She’s excited to see her brother, coming home from time in Costa Rica, but is less than thrilled when their dad shows up along with him.<\/p>\n

Their dad lives on Bribri territory in Costa Rica after years as an activist. As far as Ul\u00e1 is concerned, he’s got a long history of not keeping his promises, and that’s reinforced when he gets a flight back to Costa Rica after only two days.<\/p>\n

But then they get the news that he died of a heart attack only a couple days after going back. Ul\u00e1 and her brother go to attend his funeral, in keeping with the Bribri ways. But then things turn up that suggest maybe his death wasn’t from natural causes as the police believe.<\/p>\n

We end up with a gripping mystery, and a story about family and community, with plenty of historical background information about injustices against indigenous people in general, and Bribri people in particular.<\/p>\n

There are chapters interspersed from the perspective of Ul\u00e1’s ancestors, watching over her, seeing what’s happening on the land.<\/p>\n

And all of this is told about characters you quickly care about, with relationships that are complicated, as in real life.<\/p>\n

And yes, as the cover hints, there are venomous snakes in this book.<\/p>\n

aritison.com<\/a><\/p>\n

Buy from Amazon.com<\/a><\/p>\n

Find this review on Sonderbooks<\/a> at: www.sonderbooks.com\/Teens\/together_we_see.html<\/a><\/p>\n

Disclosure: I am an Amazon Affiliate, and will earn a small percentage if you order a book on Amazon after clicking through from my site.<\/p>\n

Disclaimer: I am a professional librarian, but the views expressed are solely my own, and in no way represent the official views of my employer or of any committee or group of which I am part.<\/p>\n

Subscribe<\/a> for more reviews and talk about books.<\/p>\n

Join the conversation: What did you think of this book?<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Together We See by Ari Tison Farrar Straus Giroux, 2026. 310 pages. Review written July 24, 2026, from my own copy, sent to me by the publisher. Starred Review I suspect the publisher sent me Ari Tison’s new book because I was on the 2024 Morris Award Committee that chose her debut novel, Saints of […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[21,42,8],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-46742","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-contemporary","category-starred-review","category-teen-fiction-review"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/sonderbooks.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/46742","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/sonderbooks.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/sonderbooks.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sonderbooks.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sonderbooks.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=46742"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/sonderbooks.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/46742\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":46753,"href":"https:\/\/sonderbooks.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/46742\/revisions\/46753"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/sonderbooks.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=46742"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sonderbooks.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=46742"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sonderbooks.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=46742"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}