Us by David Nicholls (2014)

David Nicholls is quickly turning into an Author I Adore. I loved his One Day (book AND surprisingly well-done movie) as well as The Understudy, so I was looking forward to his newest novel.

Us is about Connie and Dan, a long-married couple whose son is graduating. They have a Grand Tour planned when Connie tells Douglas that she doesn't want to be married anymore. But they go on the trip anyway, and, unsurprisingly, things go awry. A lovely meditation on marriage and love, featuring flawed characters and realistic situations.  Nicholls has such wonderful insights into emotion and love, and he has such marvelous, humorous turns of phrase. Like:

"Other people's sex lives are a little like other people's holidays: you're glad they had fun but you weren't there and don't necessarily want to see the photos. At our age too much detail leads to a certain amount of mental whistling and staring at shoes, and there's also the problem of vocabulary. Scientific terms, though clinically accurate, don't really convey the heady dark intensity, etc., etc. and I'd like to avoid simile of metaphor -- valley, orchid, garden, that kind of thing. Certainly I have no intention of using a whole load of swear words. So I won't go into detail, except to say that it worked out pretty well for all concerned, with that pleasant sense of self-satisfaction, as if we'd discovered that we were still capable of performing a forward roll. Afterwards we lay in a tangle of limbs." (p. 71)

Gabriel: A Poem by Edward Hirsch (2014)

Lovely memoir in poetry about Edward Hirsch's son, who passed away from an overdose. 

The poem starts at Gabriel's funeral and goes through his death as well as Gabriel's very troubled life. Lyrical and sad, and very thoughtful about grief.

I adore this quote:

"I did not know the work of mourning
Is like carrying a bag of cement
Up a mountain at night ….
Look closely and you will see
Almost everyone is carrying bags
Of cement on their shoulders
That's why it takes courage
To get out of bed in the morning
And climb into the day." (p. 73)

Hyperbole and a Half by Allie Brosh (2013)

Subtitled: Unfortunate Situations, Flawed Coping Mechanisms, Mayhem, and Other Things That Happened

Although I'd recommended and given it to a bunch of people, I was compelled to finally read it after listening to Allie Brosh's fascinating conversation with Marc Maron on the WTF podcast--one of the best discussions I've ever heard on depression.

This book is hilarious and honest and amazingly insightful into what depression feels like. Even her dog comics are adorable.  Beautifully, beautifully done.

Really. What else can be said!  Buy her book and give it to everyone you know.  Also, you should check out her blog as well, particularly:

Adventures in Depression

Depression: Part Two

And remember:

Together Tea by Marjan Kamali (2013)

Together Tea is the story of Darya, who immigrated from Iran after the Islamic Revolution with her husband Parviz and her daughter Mina. As the book begins, we see that Darya is working hard to find the perfect husband for Mina, who is in business school but longs to be an artist. Mother and daughter take a trip back to Iran to visit family and friends.

The book sort of wanders around in time and perspective, from the present day to the past in Iran, and I kept getting Darya and Mina confused for some reason, but the background of the Iranian immigrants was fascinating. The amazing story and pride of the Persian people in their heritage and the enormous upheaval is a fascinating story. I loved the characters as well, particularly the father, who speaks primarily from his study of motivational speaking tapes, and the feisty Bita, Mina’s childhood friend. I also loved the look at the culture, the roopoosh, the tarof. So fascinating. Plus, a little bit clever and witty. 

“They were playing the Persian game of tarof, a verbal tradition stressing exaggerated politeness and formality in interactions, a ritual filled with flowery flattery, endless displays of respect for the other, dramatic self-effacement, and indirect answers to unnecessary questions. Darya and Baba relished this communicative art, through Mina had spent years resisting it.” (p. 20)

“Mina had the germ of an idea: If she went back to Iran, she could figure out what her family had been, what they’d lost, what they’d gained. She could expel this sense of never belonging, feeling lost. She could “find herself,” like every character in every book she’d ever read about immigrants going back to the homeland.” (p. 59)

“Mina knew how to study and work very hard. She knew how to swing her legs on that hyphen, and on that hyphen she would stay, carrying memories of the one place from which she had come and the other place in which she must succeed. The hyphen was hers--a space small, potentially precarious. On the hyphen she would sit and on the hyphen she would stand and soon, like a seasoned acrobat, she would balance there perfectly, never falling, ever choosing either side over the other, content with walking that thin line.” (p. 67)

The Book of Unknown Americans by Cristina Henriquez (2014)

This is a perfectly lovely book, totally readable and compelling, about a family that moves from Mexico to Delaware to bring their brain-injured daughter to a good school. They move into an apartment building that houses a variety of immigrants from other countries, and develop close ties to a Panamanian family. That is, the young Panamanian boy falls in love with Maribel, and deals with his own issues of being an immigrant.

A fascinating look at the immediate effects of immigrating--when poverty is a huge part of the picture. The shabby apartment that they live in, compared to their beautiful home back in Mexico, to coming to a country and not knowing any English at all, to shopping for food from the gas station because they don’t know where to go, to job hunting when you don’t have legal papers or know the language. At the same time, there’s a beautiful community that emerges in this apartment building among all of the immigrants, despite them coming from many different countries. Beautiful look at the hard truth of a tough immigrant experience. 

And I LOVE that Henriquez intersperses personal stories of each immigrant (in the apartment building) within the narrative. So each character, even a minor supporting character we see only a few times, gets their chance to share their story. So lovely, and when you get to the very last story … ah. Just lovely.

Henriquez says about this novel:

“This book was inspired by my father, who came to the United States from Panama in 1971 to go to college, and who has been here ever since. He’s made a life here, he’s become a citizen, and even though his story isn’t dramatic or spectacular, it’s important for the simple reason that it exists at all.”

Some other quotes that I loved:

“They found other places to live. Places like Delaware. It’s cheaper than Pennsylvania. And no sales tax. We have all the Spanish supermarkets now, and the school district started those English programs. I know some people here think we’re trying to take over, but we just want to be a part of it. We want to have our stake. This is our home, too.

"I like it here. I started off as the manager, but now I own this building. Bought it out almost ten years ago after working jobs on the side, saving up. I got a good deal. The area is changing, though. A clash of cultures. I try to make this building like an island for all of us washed-ashore refugees. A safe harbor. I don’t let anyone mess with me. If people want to tell me to go home, I just turn to them and smile politely and say, I’m already there.” (p. 146)

“The only reason I’d come was because my dad thought he might need a translator. I told him, “You use English every day.” But my dad had argued that he didn’t know the language of cars. To him, everything had its own language--the language of breakfast, the language of business, the language of politics, and on and on. In Spanish he knew all the languages, for as long as he’d been speaking English, he believe he knew it was only in certain realms. He never talked about cars with anyone in English, he said. Therefore, he didn’t know the language. It was no use explaining to him that I didn’t exactly spend my days talking about cars with people, either. To him, I knew all the languages of English the way he did those of Spanish. And as proud as he was that I was so good at one, I think he was also ashamed that I wasn’t better at the other.” (p. 161)

And so much so:

“Maybe it’s the instinct of every immigrant, born of necessity or of longing: Someplace else will be better than here. And the condition: if only I can get to that place.” (p. 286)

An Untamed State by Roxane Gay (2014)

This is an utterly mesmerizing story, both very harsh and violent, but very character-driven as well. Mirelle, the child of Haitian immigrants, lives in Miami with her husband and child. Her parents have moved back to their homeland of Haiti. Mirelle is visiting her parents there and heads out one morning to the beach with her husband and son when she is kidnapped and held for ransom.

She is unbelievably brutally treated (though it’s never depicted in an exploitative way, and Gay realistically depicts the many, varied reactions to rape and abuse). After thirteen days she is freed, but her troubles are far from over. She must figure out how to heal, how to forgive her family and how to move on with her life. 

The beautiful thing about this book is how Gay depicts Mirelle’s internal struggle and her memories of her childhood, meeting her husband, and having her child as she is held captive. It’s beautifully interwoven and provides a respite from the grim reality of her situation. And I love a book that shows how people move on from tragedy. I also love that Mirelle is not a saint, not the most sympathetic character, as she describes herself as someone who is hard to love. And I love the complex relationship between her and her in-laws, and the very casual depiction of an interracial marriage. It even encompasses the earthquake that rocks Haiti. So beautifully done.

“The man sneered at me, called me dyaspora with the resentment those Haitians who cannot leave hold for those of us who can.” (p. 6)

“There are three Haitis--the country Americans know and the country Haitans know and the country I thought I knew.” (p. 11)

And Gay says of herself:

“I was born in Omaha, Nebraska. I am a first generation American. My parents emigrated from Haiti quite some time ago but they instilled in my brothers and I a profound cultural identity and they’ve since returned to the island on a part time basis.”

A Replacement Life by Boris Fishman (2014)

Marvelously, lyrically written novel about Slava, who gets involved in writing false restitution claims to the German government for his grandfather and his grandfather’s friends. Slava works at Century magazine (read: The New Yorker) and longs for a byline of his own. In the interim, he gets involved with the restitution claims, and his somewhat rocky relationship with his grandfather (and family). The family emigrated from Russia and many of the restitution claims are from happenings in the Minsk ghetto.

Immigrant issues are in these characters’ heads each and every day. Amazingly rich characters. Amazingly lyrical writing, the kind you want to linger over. His grandmother passes away as the book begins and Slava is haunted by not knowing what she went through in the war, and his family will not tell him. His grandfather is amazing character--a grafter, a “child of other people’s gardens.” Among many great quotes: 

“Our great realizations are slow dishes, but once they’re ready, they announce themselves as suddenly as an oven timer.” (p. 10) 

In the interim, he begins an affair with his cubicle mate, fact checker Arianna, and has a short dalliance with Vera, another granddaughter of immigrants. There’s a fascinating short vignette with Vera and her friends at a party where they are embracing their heritage fully, with music and speaking Russian and vodka. 

Another lovely quote from grandfather: 

“I’m an old camel now, but back then, sparks flew from my feet when I walked--you could light a cigarette if you wanted. I was known in the neighborhood.” (p. 213)

From the acknowledgements:

“My first thanks are to my grandmother. She really was better than all of us. Then to my grandfather. A friend of mine once said, “You’re smarter than him, you’re more enlightened than him. But both of us can fit inside his left nut. Hard to argue.”

Boris Fishman was born in Belarus and immigrated to the United States at the age of nine. And yes, his work has appeared in the New Yorker.

Prayers for the Stolen by Jennifer Clement (2014)

Ladydi and her friends are uglied up by their mothers to avoid being stolen by drug traffickers. They also hide in holes in the ground (like rabbits) when the Escalades come roaring through their rural area.

Narrated by Ladydi, this is an incredibly vivid portrayal of life in a small village in Mexico. Where some of the other books in this genre illustrate their culture with food and music, life in Prayers by the Stolen seems defined by the physical landscape, the bugs, the jungle. There’s a lovely scene where Ladydi is thinking about the African children she sees on television, with flies eating the children’s tears and thinks about how a mother’s job is to brush the flies away from her children’s tears.

How this relates to immigration is that Ladydi’s father left for “over there” and that is all they refer to it as. It’s an everyday part of their lives, but not seen as a great accomplishment. Their community is mostly women, because the men have all gone “over there”--some who visit and send money home, some who acquire whole new families (such as Ladydi’s father).

It’s a fascinating story--beautifully and sparely told. Plus, I also love that the cover and the images are designed by Hispanic women artists. Yay! Jennifer Clement was born in Connecticut but moved to Mexico when she was just one. She lives in Mexico City and is the president of PEN Mexico.

Family Life by Akhil Sharma (2014)

This novel begins in 1978, with Ajay, his older brother Birju and their mother leaving Delhi to join their father in America. America seems like a land of wonder and opportunity A tragic accident strikes, leaving one brother incapacitated, and the other practically orphaned in this strange land.

Lovely writing, wonderfully readable. I loved the Ajay’s voice, and his strangely profound childish insights. Fascinating insights into immigrant community life in America (the temples, the healers, the requests for blessings), interesting insight into what it’s like to care for an infirm family member for so long, and growing up as a bit of an oddball. And who doesn’t.

The writing is so spare and engaging, that it was easy to just race through the book. I wanted to savor the lines more. There’s a lovely line about Ajay feeling that he was at the bottom of the ocean - when he was feeling lonely in his room. And of course, I loved this line:

“For me, the two best things about America were television and the library. Every Saturday night I watched The Love Boat. I looked at the women in their one-piece bathing suits and their high heels and imagined what it would be like when I was married. I decided that when I was married, I would be very serious, and my silence would lead to misunderstandings between me and my wife. We would have a fight and later make up and kiss. She would be wearing a blue swimsuit as we kissed.” (p. 38)

Happiness, Like Water by Chinelo Okparanta (2013)

A collection of short stories centering around Nigerian women as they build lives out of hope, faith, and doubt, following such characters as a young woman faced with a dangerous decision to save her mother and a woman in love with another despite the penalties. The ten stories range from being set in Port Harcourt to people dreaming of America to being set in America.

Okparanta’s writing is spare and lyrical--the stories are very readable. Her settings are vividly evoked from power outages to big oil to immigrant life in America. One of the most chilling stories evokes a girl and her mother trying to escape domestic violence, but are turned down for their lack of a visa. Beautifully depicts both the Nigerian experience and the experience of Nigerian immigrants. The author was born in Nigeria and moved to America when she was around 10 or so.

 Lovely dedication: “For home.”