Dazzling, magical narratives, full of delight and sorrow.
Crujido’s surreal, romantic stories about an apartment building’s residents offer a dash of magical realism and wonder to their Pacific Northwest settings.
The collection opens with a welcome to the Mt. Vernon Apartments, a three-story building in Spokane, Washington, that houses the dreamy tales’ various characters. There’s a World War I veteran with PTSD who finds a cage containing tiny, bird-sized women with wings, dressed in silk, in “Apartment A: The Songbird (1918).” In “Apartment B: The Tower (1918),” there’s an unnamed lover, locked away like a princess in a tower during a flu epidemic, who eventually floats away like the bride in a Marc Chagall painting. A mannequin from a department store comes alive and tries to escape in “Apartment C: The Mannequin (1934)”; when a manager mistakes her for another woman, she ultimately ends up working there as an employee. Other stories feature a talking bear and a telephone that connects the present to the past. Crujido’s stories are frequently whimsical but often have a touch of melancholy: A couple meet in their dreams but are unable to stop the passage of time; a bitter and irascible widow literally loses her head. With their magic and flights of fancy, these stories have a sweetness to them that, as one passage puts it, is “sugared with sadness.” Crujido remarkably connects moments from 100 years of one building’s history, but in doing so, she reveals the sense of loss and ennui that underpins the passage of time. Indeed, the Mt. Vernon Apartments are haunted by the memories of previous stories. Throughout the collection, Crujido’s clear, careful prose is enhanced by bursts of levity, such as a refrain (“At the exact moment…”) that runs throughout “Apartment E: The Dandelion (1958),” a rich, and scathing, character study of a gossipy middle-aged woman. Gorgeous, italicized postscripts to each tale offer a memorable image or tragic note on which to linger. Individually, these works are delightful treats; together, they’re a sumptuous feast.
Dazzling, magical narratives, full of delight and sorrow.Pub Date: Oct. 24, 2023
ISBN: 9781634050531
Page Count: 202
Publisher: Chin Music Press
Review Posted Online: Nov. 27, 2023
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 15, 2024
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
Unrelenting, and not in a good way.
A young Navarrian woman faces even greater challenges in her second year at dragon-riding school.
Violet Sorrengail did all the normal things one would do as a first-year student at Basgiath War College: made new friends, fell in love, and survived multiple assassination attempts. She was also the first rider to ever bond with two dragons: Tairn, a powerful black dragon with a distinguished battle history, and Andarna, a baby dragon too young to carry a rider. At the end of Fourth Wing (2023), Violet and her lover, Xaden Riorson, discovered that Navarre is under attack from wyvern, evil two-legged dragons, and venin, soulless monsters that harvest energy from the ground. Navarrians had always been told that these were monsters of legend and myth, not real creatures dangerously close to breaking through Navarre’s wards and attacking civilian populations. In this overly long sequel, Violet, Xaden, and their dragons are determined to find a way to protect Navarre, despite the fact that the army and government hid the truth about these creatures. Due to the machinations of several traitorous instructors at Basgiath, Xaden and Violet are separated for most of the book—he’s stationed at a distant outpost, leaving her to handle the treacherous, cutthroat world of the war college on her own. Violet is repeatedly threatened by her new vice commandant, a brutal man who wants to silence her. Although Violet and her dragons continue to model extreme bravery, the novel feels repetitive and more than a little sloppy, leaving obvious questions about the world unanswered. The book is full of action and just as full of plot holes, including scenes that are illogical or disconnected from the main narrative. Secondary characters are ignored until a scene requires them to assist Violet or to be killed in the endless violence that plagues their school.
Unrelenting, and not in a good way.Pub Date: Nov. 7, 2023
ISBN: 9781649374172
Page Count: 640
Publisher: Red Tower
Review Posted Online: Jan. 20, 2024
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
SEEN & HEARD
A welcome literary resurrection that deserves a place alongside Wright’s best-known work.
A falsely accused Black man goes into hiding in this masterful novella by Wright (1908-1960), finally published in full.
Written in 1941 and '42, between Wright’s classics Native Son and Black Boy, this short novel concerns Fred Daniels, a modest laborer who’s arrested by police officers and bullied into signing a false confession that he killed the residents of a house near where he was working. In a brief unsupervised moment, he escapes through a manhole and goes into hiding in a sewer. A series of allegorical, surrealistic set pieces ensues as Fred explores the nether reaches of a church, a real estate firm, and a jewelry store. Each stop is an opportunity for Wright to explore themes of hope, greed, and exploitation; the real estate firm, Wright notes, “collected hundreds of thousands of dollars in rent from poor colored folks.” But Fred’s deepening existential crisis and growing distance from society keep the scenes from feeling like potted commentaries. As he wallpapers his underground warren with cash, mocking and invalidating the currency, he registers a surrealistic but engrossing protest against divisive social norms. The novel, rejected by Wright’s publisher, has only appeared as a substantially truncated short story until now, without the opening setup and with a different ending. Wright's take on racial injustice seems to have unsettled his publisher: A note reveals that an editor found reading about Fred’s treatment by the police “unbearable.” That may explain why Wright, in an essay included here, says its focus on race is “rather muted,” emphasizing broader existential themes. Regardless, as an afterword by Wright’s grandson Malcolm attests, the story now serves as an allegory both of Wright (he moved to France, an “exile beyond the reach of Jim Crow and American bigotry”) and American life. Today, it resonates deeply as a story about race and the struggle to envision a different, better world.
A welcome literary resurrection that deserves a place alongside Wright’s best-known work.Pub Date: April 20, 2021
ISBN: 978-1-59853-676-8
Page Count: 240
Publisher: Library of America
Review Posted Online: March 16, 2021
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 1, 2021
BOOK TO SCREEN
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