Remember way back when in Boston? It was early June and my brother came to visit. We slept on air mattresses, visited Walden Pond, and dined with Kate Winslet. We also shared a copy of The New Yorker Matt bought for his flight. It was their annual science fiction edition, and in it was a short story by Junot Diaz entitled "Monstro." Being a reader who tends to approach science fiction hesitantly, I was skeptical, but brother Matt made me read it and proved, yet again, sometimes older siblings know where it's at.
Well, that short story changed my science fiction feelings in one sitting. I realized it wasn't the genre that had turned me off but the few weak science fiction selections I had read. Often sci-fi takes place in some extreme setting (a space colony, the year 2400, etc.) with high action and risk. These are the books I have struggled through finding it difficult despite the dynamic characters to relate. I suppose I also have a hard time with the technical language because I can get into a good fantasy read no problem and those books also tend to be set in vastly different places than those I'm familiar with but I digress.
Back to the floor of my Boston apartment, Mr. Diaz had crafted a fantastic work of fiction with an eerie underscore of science in the form of medical science (plagues) that was so very plausible. The plausibility is what made it so good. This story (set in maybe 2025?) describes a kid from New Jersey's summer in his family's homeland of the Dominican Republic. Meanwhile, in neighboring Haiti, things are getting crazy in the refugee camps that have lingered since the devastating earthquake. Disease is breaking out in these camps, and people are willing to go to extremes to stop it…Isn't everything I just wrote entirely possible?! That's what makes it good, great fiction.
I had read the Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao, Diaz's 2007 novel with which he won the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction, before, but "Monstro" is what sold me on the author.
So when I heard he had a new book coming out, I knew I couldn't wait for the paperback. I went ahead and bought it in hardback like a sucker. But it's okay. Matt will want to read it, too.
This is How You Lose Her brings back Yunior, a recurring character in some of Diaz's earlier work. He narrates many of the stories in this collection that flow together to ultimately tell, really, one narrative of love gained and lost by this young Dominican man from New Jersey. Despite his numerous flaws, your heart sort of breaks for Yunior as he makes the same mistakes with women over and over again and practices unparalleled bouts of infidelity.
Diaz writes with a fast tempo, a rhythm that keeps you plowing through the pages with an almost reckless abandon. His last story in which you find Yunior middle aged leaves your heart pounding until the last page which makes it sound as if the book is plot driven which isn't true. What do you call it when the writer writes as if you are the subject?
"You sit on a plastic chair in front of the house with the kid in your lap. The neighbors admire you with cheerful avidity. A domino game breaks out and you team up with Baby Mama's brooding brother. Takes him less than five seconds to talk you into ordering a couple of grandes and a bottle of Brugal from the nearby colmado" (204).
I love that style.
If you're wary of a little sexual language, stay away. There's plenty here. But don't let that scare you. Underneath it all, this is a very human collection about all sorts of love, the real and complicated love that goes on all around you. Love that isn't always clean and sometimes isn't clearly love. It is a collection of realistic stories where adults don't always act like adults. And, if anything, isn't that one of the most honest parts of a human story?
So get his book. And I would go so far as to say it is worth the hardcover price. And if you don't get the book, find a copy of "Monstro" from The New Yorker, June 2012.
And don't look back.
No comments:
Post a Comment