The book Ive just finished reading is 'DROWN' by a Dominican American author Junot Diaz who won the 2008 Pulitzer prize for fiction.Diaz was born in Santo Domingo,the capital of the Dominican Republic and lived there till he immigrated with his family to New Jersey when he was six years old.DROWN is his debut short story collection.
The book has ten very different and interesting short stories which are largely autobiographical and portray his life in the Dominican Republic and later as an immigrant in New Jersey.These stories are connected to each other and have to be read in the order in which they are narrated rather than randomly picking any one.
My Views:
We read sometimes to enter another world and get a view into lives we otherwise would have never known to exist.This book offered me a glimpse into a completely different way of life and living.
The way people react to circumstances,the way their childhood is shaped,the way they turn out to be who they are is influenced largely by where they are coming from.Different lives,different stories.
There is a stark contrast between his homeland in Santo Domingo and life in NYC and New Jersey.The feelings of rootlesness,leaving a country and culture behind in hopes of attaining the great American dream and the emotional upheaval that comes with it, is a price every immigrant has to pay.These stories are written in a very raw and direct way,like how it actually happened,sometimes lewd and the effect of this kind of powerful writing is that it manages to pull you into his story and view it like your own.It succeeds in evoking emotions on either end of the spectrum.
I have mentioned my views about each story in brief.
1.Ysrael:
Tells the story of Yunior and his brother Rafa in the Dominican Republic,searching for a neighbourhood boy,Ysrael,whose face was bitten off and disfigured by a pig,causing him to wear a mask at all times.
This story to me was of a chidhood destroyed,when young boys grow lawlessly and quickly beyond their age,with noone to guide them or set a particular code of conduct.Rafa is wise beyond his years and has lost his childhood.They know they have to scrimp on food and a bus ride.Money is scarce.On the other hand it also talks about Ysraels hope of being called to America and get treated by doctors there.
And I also learnt a lot of Spanish swear and cuss words.
2.Fiesta,1980:
Tells us about a family party in the Bronx,hosted by Yuniors aunt.How the kids know that the father is two timing his mother with a Puerto Rican woman yet choose to be silent about it and Yuniors fondness for his mother who was always very compassionate and tolerant.We are also shown a very ugly side to his father who is strict to the point of madness.It was heartbreaking to read Yuniors attempts at overcoming his carsickness in the fear that it would annoy his belligerent father,who was more concerned about his brand new VW than about his son.The punishments meted out to the child are deplorable.He writes that they were 'imaginative'.Makes you wonder.
3.Aurora:
A very strange narrative.Talks about his life as a drug dealer and his romantic relationship with Aurora,a heroin addict.Complete futility was what this chapter meant to me.The inability to love or have a normal relationship.To not know what is 'normal' anymore.Drugs,their easy accessibilty and their capability to ruin lives.Yet the desire to hope somewhere which they know is just a dream.This was too hard to read.
4.Aguantando:
His need for a father he never knew.He writes that his father left for New York when he was four but 'since I couldnt remember a single moment with him,I excused him from all nine years of my life'.The mother's struggles with raising them up single handedly.Being sent off to live with different relatives when finances were bleak.His fathers empty promises of coming to fetch them.Missing a father who was never there and dreaming about his fathers visit which would eventually turn out very differently.
5.Drown:
Describes the narrators relationship with a close friend Beto and eventually falling out with him because of his sexual advances.Being betrayed in the most basic of relations.Living a life which makes your feel that nothing will ever shock you anymore.Sadness and Anger.
6.Boyfriend:
Yunior is dealing with his own heartbreak and simultaneously overhearing the ups and downs of a relationship between his neighbours through the walls.This was also about trying to see if he could establish some bond with the woman.I guess this story was about trying to move on after a break up.
7.Edison,New Jersey:
Yuniors time as a pool table delivery man with his partner Wayne.He is now world-weary with a lot of bottled up rage.We see the kind of person he turns out to be.But we know where he is coming from.It also marks the end of a romantic relationship.
8.How to date a Browngirl,Blackgirl,Whitegirl or Halfie:
Lots of advice on how to behave or act depending upon the ethnicity and social class of your date.Weird,Unemotional,Artificial,Screwed -up.
9.No Face:
Ysraels story from his own perspective and his long wait for the facial reconstruction surgery by Canadian Doctors.This was extremely sad to read.
10.Negocios:
After all that he told us about his father,this chapter at the end tries to redeem his father,by showing us what exactly Rafael went through after coming to the United States.His struggles with language,boarding,financial issues.Marrying an American to obtain citizenship.The gnawing guilt at leaving his family behind.The other womans point of view and realization.Too little...too late.
My only grouse was that a lot of spanish words are scattered liberally and it was difficult to discern the meanings of a few phrases.Apart from that ,the book is a very honest portrayal of a very fractured life.
I rate it a 3 and a half out of 5.
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