Haunting, tender, and profound meditations on the experiences of Central American migrants and their families.
A debut collection of stories centered on the Salvadoran diaspora.
Salvadoran American storyteller Reyes threads together tales blending family dynamics and the migratory challenges of the Latin American diaspora with an edge of the uncanny, surreal, and outlandish. In “He Eats His Own,” Neto, a successful professional in Los Angeles and the child of Salvadoran immigrants, takes increasingly dangerous steps to satisfy an obsession with homegrown mangoes even as it unravels his relationship, leads to the deaths of relatives, and threatens to imprison his only surviving relation, an orphaned cousin who sobs when Neto gifts him a mango sapling, “an intense fear spreading from his throat all the way down to his green thumb.” In “My Abuela, the Puppet,” the narrator’s grandmother slowly morphs into a marionette, beginning with her oversize orthopedic sneakers, until her knockoff Louis Vuitton handbag transforms into felt and her thinning frame leaves errant tufts of wool on bedsheets and her wheelchair. Abuela the Puppet hangs on a wall in the living room until one night she sings out in a strong voice: “Ay, ay, ay, ay, canta, y no llores.” A series of searing vignettes punctuates the collection. Each one is titled “An Alternate History of El Salvador or Perhaps the World,” and they reimagine infamous episodes from Salvadoran history, such as the quick defeat of 16th-century colonizers or the ghastly rearrangement of Indigenous remains into the shape of a dinosaur that will be named Maximilianodon, for the tyrant dictator who thought “drawing a little bit of blood once in a while was part of the job.” Tethered to historical fact and enlivened by speculative elements, Reyes’ fiction brings into focus the troubling legacies that stalk so many Central American nations: the enduring “belief that we can bury our monstrosities underneath a pile of ash and bones.”
Haunting, tender, and profound meditations on the experiences of Central American migrants and their families.Pub Date: Aug. 6, 2024
ISBN: 9780063336278
Page Count: 240
Publisher: Mariner Books
Review Posted Online: June 15, 2024
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 15, 2024
A vibrant tale of a remarkable woman.
Who was Shakespeare?
Move over, Earl of Oxford and Francis Bacon: There’s another contender for the true author of plays attributed to the bard of Stratford—Emilia Bassano, a clever, outspoken, educated woman who takes center stage in Picoult’s spirited novel. Of Italian heritage, from a family of court musicians, Emilia was a hidden Jew and the courtesan of a much older nobleman who vetted plays to be performed for Queen Elizabeth. She was well traveled—unlike Shakespeare, she visited Italy and Denmark, where, Picoult imagines, she may have met Rosencrantz and Guildenstern—and was familiar with court intrigue and English law. “Every gap in Shakespeare’s life or knowledge that has had to be explained away by scholars, she somehow fills,” Picoult writes. Encouraged by her lover, Emilia wrote plays and poetry, but 16th-century England was not ready for a female writer. Picoult interweaves Emilia’s story with that of her descendant Melina Green, an aspiring playwright, who encounters the same sexist barriers to making herself heard that Emilia faced. In alternating chapters, Picoult follows Melina’s frustrated efforts to get a play produced—a play about Emilia, who Melina is certain sold her work to Shakespeare. Melina’s play, By Any Other Name, “wasn’t meant to be a fiction; it was meant to be the resurrection of an erasure.” Picoult creates a richly detailed portrait of daily life in Elizabethan England, from sumptuous castles to seedy hovels. Melina’s story is less vivid: Where Emilia found support from the witty Christopher Marlowe, Melina has a fashion-loving gay roommate; where Emilia faces the ravages of repeated outbreaks of plague, for Melina, Covid-19 occurs largely offstage; where Emilia has a passionate affair with the adoring Earl of Southampton, Melina’s lover is an awkward New York Times theater critic. It’s Emilia’s story, and Picoult lovingly brings her to life.
A vibrant tale of a remarkable woman.Pub Date: Aug. 20, 2024
ISBN: 9780593497210
Page Count: 544
Publisher: Ballantine
Review Posted Online: June 15, 2024
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 15, 2024
"Don't go into the woods" takes on unsettling new meaning in Moore's blend of domestic drama and crime novel.
Many years after her older brother, Bear, went missing, Barbara Van Laar vanishes from the same sleepaway camp he did, leading to dark, bitter truths about her wealthy family.
One morning in 1975 at Camp Emerson—an Adirondacks summer camp owned by her family—it's discovered that 13-year-old Barbara isn't in her bed. A problem case whose unhappily married parents disdain her goth appearance and "stormy" temperament, Barbara is secretly known by one bunkmate to have slipped out every night after bedtime. But no one has a clue where's she permanently disappeared to, firing speculation that she was taken by a local serial killer known as Slitter. As Jacob Sluiter, he was convicted of 11 murders in the 1960s and recently broke out of prison. He's the one, people say, who should have been prosecuted for Bear's abduction, not a gardener who was framed. Leave it to the young and unproven assistant investigator, Judy Luptack, to press forward in uncovering the truth, unswayed by her bullying father and male colleagues who question whether women are "cut out for this work." An unsavory group portrait of the Van Laars emerges in which the children's father cruelly abuses their submissive mother, who is so traumatized by the loss of Bear—and the possible role she played in it—that she has no love left for her daughter. Picking up on the themes of families in search of themselves she explored in Long Bright River (2020), Moore draws sympathy to characters who have been subjected to spousal, parental, psychological, and physical abuse. As rich in background detail and secondary mysteries as it is, this ever-expansive, intricate, emotionally engaging novel never seems overplotted. Every piece falls skillfully into place and every character, major and minor, leaves an imprint.
"Don't go into the woods" takes on unsettling new meaning in Moore's blend of domestic drama and crime novel.Pub Date: July 2, 2024
ISBN: 9780593418918
Page Count: 496
Publisher: Riverhead
Review Posted Online: April 13, 2024
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 15, 2024
PERSPECTIVES
SEEN & HEARD
SEEN & HEARD
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