Review: Evicted

Evicted: Poverty and Profit in the American City, by Matthew Desmond; narrated by Dion Graham (Random House Audio 2016)

First line: “Jori and his cousin were cutting up, tossing snowballs at passing cars.”

I was considering downloading Evicted to fulfill a #19Nonfiction reading challenge prompt for a Pulitzer Prize nominee, and when I saw Dion Graham was the narrator, the deal was sealed.

Set in a city I am very familiar with, my mom’s hometown of Milwaukee, Matthew Desmond profiles eight families living of the edge, as well as two landlords managing several of their homes, in areas of the city in which I admittedly have very little familiarity. Many, many of America’s families are living in poverty and finding themselves on the brink of eviction or on the hunt for a new apartment time and time again, as evictions become commonplace. Reading very much like Isabel Wilkerson’s The Warmth of Other Suns and Katherine Boo’s Behind the Beautiful Forevers, Evicted is a masterful work of storytelling that shows the complexity of the housing crisis in our nation’s cities and what needs to be done to solve it.

Despite what he explicitly says he didn’t want, I found Desmond’s afterword “About this Project” to be perhaps the most fascinating part. In it, he shares how he conducted his research with the individuals featured in his book. He explains that it is standard practice now for ethnographers to write in the first person, showing how they are living among those they are researching and interviewing. However, Desmond purposefully tried to take himself out of the story, only using the first person in this afterword, so that his subjects were the ones the reader remembers, and I found this to be very effective. I think his subjects came alive to me in a way they might not have, had I been reading from the white, well-off, male researcher perspective. That said, the story was equally brought to life by the the narrator, Dion Graham, who is Black, as are many of the subjects of this book. He has swiftly become one of my favorite audiobook narrators, another along with Bahni Turpin, for which I will download books he narrates regardless of what they are.

Well worthy of the Pulitzer Prize it received, and enhanced by Graham’s excellent narration.

Review: Finding Me

Finding Me, by Viola Davis (Harper Audio 2022)

First line: “Cocksucker motherfucker” was my favorite expression, and at eight years old, I used it defiantly.”

Hearing Viola Davis speak that first line into my ears had me wildly grinning in surprise. For me, Viola Davis is a Hollywood icon, a serious actor, recognizable in films and television from my early teenage years till now, which is why so much of this incredibly written memoir caught me by surprise. Not only did a fair bit of it make me laugh, which was unexpected, but also I had zero concept of her rough childhood rooted in serious poverty and abuse, and her fierce determination and hard work that brought her out of that.

From the gripping first chapter, when we are introduced to her mother and begin to get a sense of how she shaped Viola’s motivations, to the final chapters when we meet her now-husband of twenty years and happiness and fulfillment are finally within her grasp, this memoir never stops. I was exhausted just listening to it. That she is willing to share the devastating details of her past with us in such an intimate way was incredibly humbling.

I don’t think there’s any other real way to consume this book than through the audiobook, as Davis’s narration is spectacular. There’s a reason she won the Grammy for it, earning her a spot among the only 18 people in history to have reached EGOT status. Do yourself a favor and download this one asap, and then join me as we go on a binge on everything she’s ever made (like, how have I never watched How to Get Away with Murder??).

Review: Stories from the Tenants Downstairs

Stories from the Tenants Downstairs, by Sidik Fofana (narrated by a full cast) (Simon & Schuster Audio 2022)

First line: “Days left: 10… money you got: $0… money you need: $350.”

In this collection of interconnected short stories, debut author Sidik Fofana dives into the lives of various residents of a certain Harlem highrise. In the 50 pages or less (often much less) that Fofana devotes to each character, he transforms them from the stereotype these characters might project, or more likely is assumed to be from the onlooker — such as “the criminal”, “the Welfare Queen”, “the lazy student”, “the bum” — and paints a portrait of a person you can’t help but empathize with. He points out hypocrisy, offers nuance, and highlights gray areas in places society often does not permit. The audio narration features a full cast, with each narrator voicing a chapter (including Fofana himself, and my fave narrator Bahni Turpin), and is excellently done. It’s a short listen, so if you’re looking for another book to complete in 2022, this would be easy to put in your ears during a hefty wrapping session — although, it’s not going to necessarily put you in a jolly mood! Perhaps a good balance for the more fluffy holiday rom-coms so many of us enjoy during this season.

Review: Last Summer on State Street

Last Summer on State Street, by Toya Wolfe; narrated by Shayna Small (Harper Audio 2022)

First line: “I’d known Precious forever, Stacia a year, and Tonya for just a minute.”

Brought together by their double dutch rope, Last Summer on State Street tells the story of four girls with vastly different upbringings, despite all finding themselves living in the Chicago projects in the summer of 1999. Fe Fe, our narrator, lives with her mother and her big brother whom she adores, and is worrying about her building being the next to be knocked down by the Chicago Housing Authority. She’s also worried about her brother who has been growing more distant and hanging around with a new crew. And when she innocently brings a fourth girl into their jump rope group that summer, she has no idea that such an action may begin the unfolding of life as she knows it.

This short book, narrated excellently by Shayna Small, is still incredibly full – full of life, fierce love, and heartbreak. Because the four friends are all so different (one raised by a present and protective single mother, one raised in a deeply devoted church family, one whose family is fully entrenched in gang life, and one who is basically left to fend for herself), Wolfe is able to ask if we are simply victims of our circumstances, or if we are capable of creating meaningful changes to our lives. She tackles innocence, regret, and community in ways that are very powerful and effecting, particularly for such a slim novel. This book is not an easy read, yet I found it hard to stop listening, as I just was so desperate to learn what would happen to Fe Fe and her friends.

Review: The Bridge Home

The Bridge Home, by Padma Venkatraman (narrated by the author) (Listening Library 2019)

First line: “Talking to you was always easy, Rukku. But writing’s hard.”

My first choice for #MiddleGradeMarch was a book I’ve been meaning to get to for years. The Bridge Home was all over the place back in 2019 when it was released, earning all sorts of starred reviews from major review sources and the coveted Walter Dean Myers Award, which recognizes children’s literature written by diverse authors that celebrate and discuss diversity in a meaningful way. (Past winners have included favorites such as Firekeeper’s Daughter, A Long Way Down, Punching the Air, and The Poet X.)

The Bridge Home follows sisters Viji and Rukku who have recently run away from an abusive father and have decided to try to make it on their own on the streets of Chennai in India. Although Viji is technically the younger sister, Rukku has a developmental disability that has always made Viji feel responsible to watching out for her. While Viji knows that staying at home was no longer a viable option, she finds out that the streets are more dangerous and frightening than she was expecting. But soon the sisters meet two other young outcasts, Muthi and Arul, and the four become a tighter-knit family than any of them have experienced in the past.

I found this to be a beautiful story of found family and survival. In a story that could have been a “depressing” book, and one that definitely had its heartbreaking moments, I didn’t feel that way reading it, and think that Muthi’s humor and Viji’s determination keep it from veering in that direction. I was also glad that this book didn’t succumb to the “all adults are terrible” trope so often seen in children’s literature. While there were certainly some villains here, there were also good and compassionate adults that helped these kids survive when they might otherwise have not. The author narrates this audiobook (which isn’t always a good thing where fiction is concerned), and she did an excellent job bringing her characters and situations to life.

A solid addition to the middle grade canon, and one that will be eye-opening to many young readers.

Review: Genesis Begins Again

Genesis Begins Again, by Alicia D. Williams (Caitlyn Dlouhy Books 2019)

First line: “Nobody could tell me that today wasn’t gon’ be my day.”

Good gracious, will you look at that cover? Not only is the cover art stunning, but poor Genesis’s face is almost covered with all the medals this baby took home at the ALA Youth Media Awards in 2020. And for good reason. Williams’ debut novel about 7th grader Genesis is one that will certainly be talked about for a long time.

Genesis Begins Again starts with Genesis super proud that her pack of friends have finally agreed to come hang out at her house, only to find all her family’s belongings and furniture have been put out on the lawn. They have been evicted, again. Genesis’s father, notoriously unreliable, has once again gambled away their rent money, forcing them to move one more time. This time, he’s able to secure a nice home in a mostly-white suburb of Detroit through a coworker, and Genesis and her mother hope that this might just be the change they’ve been waiting for. But for Genesis, being in a school of mostly white kids has made her dark brown skin and textured hair even more noticeable. She would much rather have her mother’s light brown skin and smooth hair, but genetics have passed on her father’s traits instead.

Genesis has deeply internalized the colorism — discrimination toward those with darker complexions, both from within and outside of one’s own racial group — she experiences from classmates and from even her own family, and this is what I found to be the most unsettling part of this novel. Genesis, while a smart, talented, kind young girl, sees only how she appears on the surface, and hates herself for it. Her efforts to lighten her skin are excruciating to watch, and there were many times I wished I could jump into the pages and give her a hug. Fortunately, at her new school Genesis finds two true friends who both support her and challenge her, and they are her saving graces where she previously had none.

This is a heartbreaking book, but I loved to see Genesis’s growth throughout the novel, and found the unresolved ending a particularly unique choice for middle grade. I think many young readers will be able to see bits of themselves in these pages as well as find an eye-opening experience.

Review: Salvage the Bones

Salvage the Bones, by Jesmyn Ward (Bloomsbury 2011)

First line: “China’s turned on herself.”

One of my best friends told me to read this book years ago. And then again this year, when I asked her for a recommendation to finish up my Living My Best Bookish Life Challenge, she again told me about Salvage the Bones, how well written it was, how beautiful it was despite the pain it contained. And, friends, she was absolutely right.

I had read Ward’s newer book, Sing, Unburied, Sing, several years ago and didn’t love it as much as I’d hoped. The magical realism, ghosty element didn’t do it for me in that one. But Salvage the Bones, while told in the same sort of lyrical writing, is rooted very much in the real, raw life of a family in small town coastal Mississippi, and it took my breath away.

Told in the 10 days leading up to, and concluding on the day after, Hurricane Katrina, Salvage the Bones is told to us from the perspective of Esch, a fifteen year old girl who recently discovered she is pregnant by the best friend of one of her old brothers. The only girl in a family of four males and their male friends (her mother died during the birth of Esch’s baby brother Junior), Esch struggles to figure out what it means to be a girl, a woman, a mother among so many men. Ward’s writing is gorgeous, truly some of the most beautiful writing I’ve read in a very long time, which is so interestingly juxtaposed against the raw, gritty, often ugly details of Esch’s world. This is a story of siblings, the bond they share and the ways they are a part of you like no one else is.

While I was reading this, it felt like a solid 4-star book. And then when the hurricane approaches and hits, it started inching up to 4.5 stars. But those last two chapters… not to be punny, but I was blown away. The way Ward tells the story of the hurricane is extraordinary and harrowing, and so much happens and is expressed in even the slightest moment. This is not a pleasant or enjoyable read, to be sure, but I felt so much while reading, and my heart felt so full with these characters.

Review: Anxious People

Anxious People, by Fredrik Backman (Atria Books 2020)

First line: “A bank robbery. A hostage drama. A stairwell full of police officers on their way to storm an apartment.”

Unlike most Backman novels, his newest seems to be pretty polarizing: either you love it with all your heart, or … you don’t. This was my first Backman novel outside of Beartown (both of which I loved), so I wasn’t sure what to expect, but even so, it still surprised me. And not in a necessarily great way.

On the surface, this book is about exactly what is mentioned in the first two sentences: “A bank robbery. A hostage drama.” And yet, it’s not really about that at all, because both the bank robbery and hostage drama fail miserable (depending on who you ask, I guess), and instead it’s a character study on the people who find themselves a part of the hostage drama.

Now, Backman sure knows how to write a poignant sentence or paragraph. I was highlighting quote after quote. He also reliably has a knack for building suspense and then ripping the rug out from under you with a single sentence. In the Beartown novels, that was part of what I loved. I loved the drama of the short chapters and carefully placed cliffhangers. But in this case, I often found myself irritated. There’s one particular twist about halfway (I think?) through the novel that made me particularly annoyed at the author — it felt like he was laughing at us, proud of his own trick. I spent a considerable amount of time swiping back through, looking for hints (difficult in an eBook), and just got more and more irritated. Not to mention the incredibly irritating cast of characters! They all drove me crazy for the first half! Eventually, by the end, I felt some sort of affection toward all of them (which is a nod to Backman’s skill at developing empathetic characters), but it took a GOOD while to get there. Part of the reason I was able to get there is that — despite there being only one physical mask in the bunch (oh wait. two. there’s a rabbit head.) — each of these characters is masking a complicated backstory that explains a good deal of why they are the way they are. Most if not all of them have experiences that are personally devastating or emotionally crippling, and Backman slowly reveals that along the way. These are the pieces I found to be compelling and interesting. However, so much of it is buried underneath the humor, quirkiness, and absurdity that Backman uses on the surface, a technique that almost felt … disrespectful? of the things these characters have gone through.

This was not my favorite Backman yet, but he sure has an appealing writing style that will keep me coming back for more. I just hope the next one I read isn’t full of as many obnoxious characters.

Review: The Book Woman of Troublesome Creek

The Book Woman of Troublesome Creek, by Kim Michele Richardson (Sourcebooks Landmark 2019)

First line: “The librarian and her mule spotted it at the same time.”

The Book Woman of Troublesome Creek tells the story of Cussy Mary Carter (tough first name, friend, even if it is after a village in France), known to many as Bluet, due to the color of her skin. Some generations back, Cussy Mary’s ancestors were carriers of a special genetic trait that causes the blood disorder methemoglobinemia, giving a blue tint to one’s skin. In Cussy Mary’s very rural community in Kentucky’s Appalachia mountains, it makes her a pariah. While her pa is only interested in finding her a suitable match, Cussy Mary’s happy to remain single, as it allows her to continue her position of traveling librarian as part of the Kentucky Pack Horse Library Project, one of Roosevelt’s WPA programs. Traveling through rain or snow or fog or sunshine, Cussy Mary brings books, newspapers, pamphlets, and scrapbooks of local recipes and lore to all the folks on her appointed mountain route, and along the way develops a surprising community of people she deeply cares about and who care about her.

Richardson goes into this a bit in her lengthy afterword, but the amount of research that went in to this book is pretty outstanding. She had to do much research into the 1930s rural Kentucky setting, into her protagonist’s blood disorder, into the WPA program, into the traditions and lifestyles of Kentucky’s mountain people, into the lives of coal miners (Cussy’s father), and more. All of that felt seamlessly integrated into the story in a way that wasn’t distracting or “educational.” That is the skill of an excellent historical fiction writer.

However, I found the pacing of this novel to be problematic. For about the first third, I almost DNFed it several times. There was at once too much happening too quickly, while also feeling so slow. In the last third, I finally felt emotionally invested in Cussy Mary’s story, grieving with her when she encountered some unexpected horrors and losses, celebrating for her when she finds joy. And then the last two chapters were MADNESS. The rollercoaster went from happy to devastated so quickly, and then she wrapped things up with a “four years later” letter in the last chapter. It felt so wildly rushed in a way that didn’t seem fair to the emotion of the story or to the reader going on it with Cussy Mary.

Review: The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes

The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes, by Suzanne Collins; narrated by Santino Fontana (Scholastic Audio 2020)

First line: “Coriolanus released the fistful of cabbage into the pot of boiling water and swore one day it would never pass his lips again.”

The lit world was all abuzz back in 2019 when it was released that Suzanne Collins was writing a new Hunger Games book, this time a prequel featuring a young President Snow. A lot of HG fans had really high hopes, although some speculated that what the world doesn’t need is another villain redeeming origin story, particularly when that villain is an old white male who presides over a government who kills kids for entertainment. While I was a big fan of the series, I felt myself more leaning toward the latter camp, but figured I’d eventually read it anyway. So I had mixed feelings going in. Unfortunately, reading the thing didn’t resolve those for me one bit.

As mentioned, this prequel dials back the Panem clock to the lead up to the 10th annual Hunger Games, the first year the Capital will be including mentors for each of the district contestants, in an effort to drum up some interest. Rather than pulling the mentors from past winners of the games, as is done later in the timeline, this first selection comes from the best and brightest of the local Capital youth, including a young 18 year old Coriolanus Snow. Coriolanus is thrilled to be included, because with a good showing, he’s likely to get support for University, and although his family still appears to be among the elite, the Snows really lost everything during the war, including the lives of both his parents. Coriolanus now lives with his grandmother and cousin, with barely enough food to scrape by. He’s initially crushed to find out that he’s been paired with the girl tribute from District 12, because she’s likely to be one of the first deaths — or so he thinks. But when Lucy Grey makes a memorable showing at the District 12 reaping, Coriolanus realizes she might not fare so poorly after all. And most unexpected of all, their relationship might move beyond mentor and tribute.

Here’s the thing. Those of us who’ve read/watched the Hunger Games know that Coriolanus Snow is a big old d-bag. The worst of the worst d-bags, in fact. The serene grandfather type who sits on his throne in the Capital watching with glee as children tear each other apart year after year. I hate to break it to you, but he kind of starts off as a d-bag too. And by the end? SUPER D-BAG. I don’t want to go into details to avoid spoilers, but let’s just say that this isn’t the redemption story some people feared. I feel like my empathy scale goes pretty high, I always assume there’s more to the story and like to give people the benefit of the doubt. But I did not ever once feel sorry for, or even really feel understanding for, Coriolanus Snow. He’s just a bad dude. And while I enjoyed seeing how things developed in Panem and being back in the Hunger Games world (as much as one can enjoy that world), because Collins is an excellent world-builder, I cannot say that I enjoyed my experience reading this book. It’s really hard to enjoy a first person narration of someone you really and truly detest. Also, Lucy Grey is a singer/songwriter, which meant that the book was sprinkled throughout with song lyrics. Lots of song lyrics. I could have done with fewer of those.