The Forgetting Tree by Tatjana Soli is a novel set on a large citrus ranch in Southern California that has existed for many generations. When tragedy strikes, it seems there is no moving forward, yet somehow the family does. Years later, illness strikes Claire, the mother, and a Caribbean born caretaker is found as a live-in aid, bringing two radically different cultures together. At this point the book takes some very strange turns and I felt like I was reading…
Homegoing by Yaa Gyasi is a novel that spans 300 years of one family’s history in Ghana and America. The novel goes back and forth between two branches of the family tree, each chapter skipping to the next generation. Written in this style, the book felt more like a series of connected short stories than a novel; each time I grew interested in a character, the story moved on to another completely new character. What Gyasi set out to accomplish…
The Girl With the Ghost Eyes by M.H. Boroson is a novel set in San Francisco’s Chinatown at the end of the 19th century. A daughter of a famous exorcist is cursed with being able to see spirits. She is drawn into a plot to take control of Chinatown by gangsters, spirits, curses and evil spells. She must call on all her magical and martial arts training to fight them, with the help of a little spirit in the shape…
Thirteen Ways of Looking at a Fat Girl by Mona Awad is a collection of 13 short stories that read together as a book. Lizzie is the girl in the title who is fat most of her life, until she gets thin. Even after she gets thin, she still sees herself as a fat girl. Awad’s writing is clever and witty, sad and tender. She brings into the spotlight our culture’s obsession with body size. Her observations are spot on,…
Falling, A Love Story, by Jane Green, seems full of cliche characters in a very predictable story, but it takes a rather tragic turn near the end. This makes the book less predictable, but not better, just sad. I used to like some of Jane Green’s books, but this is one to skip.
And After Many Days by Jowhor Ile is a deceptively simple little novel that packs a huge emotional punch. Ile’s writing is sparse and lyrical, the spaces he leaves speak volumes. It is the story of the Utu family and their three children. When Paul, the oldest boy, goes missing one day, the family is thrown into disarray. Mostly told from younger brother Ajie’s point of view, the novel is partly a portrait of a Nigerian family struggling to put…
Gold Fame Citrus by Claire Vaye Watkins is a fever dream of a novel set in an imagined near future where the drought in Southern California has reached extreme measures and everyone except a few stragglers have been evacuated. Luz and Ray, squatting in a starlet’s mansion, are drifting through the days playing house until they encounter a child and decide to head east and look for a better life. The Amargosa, a huge dune sea growing and swallowing everything…
The Year of the Runaways by Sunjeev Sahota is another immigrant book, this one much grittier and more painful than Behold the Dreamers. It tells the story of four Indian immigrants, three young men and one young woman, all trying to make a better life for themselves and their families by finding work in England. Once there, the reality of finding any kind of work is brutal and if they are there illegally, almost impossible. Sahota follows the lives of…
Behold the Dreamers is a wonderful debut novel by Imbolo Mbue. It is a novel about an immigrant family from Cameroon and the rich white family they work for in NYC. Mbue captures both cultures beautifully, and we come to care deeply for the characters she has created. This is a brilliant novel that deeply explores the immigrant dream, with all its struggles, false hopes and ultimate redemption. A great read.
Waters Ghosts by Shawna Yang Ryan is a very atmospheric little novel about a small Chinese farming town on the Sacramento River in the 1920’s. Yang Ryan weaves history and myth together to paint a picture of Chinese immigrant life. When three women arrive in town on a boat coming in from the mist, no one is sure of who they really are and how they got there. The whole novel felt like a dream. A worthwhile read.