This read was as chaotic and exciting as the craziest
day of your life (lol).
As we enter the
story, our protagonist, Carlotta Mercedes, who has been transitioning from male to
female, is being released from a stint in prison, where she spent years incarcerated
for a crime she may or may not have committed (you won’t catch me doing any
spoiler alerts!). She has been trapped
on an all-male cell block and is a victim of sexual assault by both guards and
fellow inmates.
Coming home, she must stay on the right (legal) path and find a job while staying out of trouble and under the eye of her
dispassionate PO while living in a home that is damn near a 24-hour
speakeasy, with a never-ending party in full swing, and alcohol and drugs are
as ubiquitous as salsa music and merengue dancing. And this is a quinceanera!!
Carlotta tries to come to terms with the changes to
her gentrified NY neighborhood, the ‘friends’ who were involved in the crime
when she was still a man, and the PTSD from her prison experience. Will she succeed?
I loved this story because it reminds me of the
friends I hung out with and tells a sobering story in a fun way. It focuses on people on the margins of
society and shows that all of us have a story worth telling.
In this “dangerously hilarious” novel (Los Angeles Times), a trans woman reenters life on the outside after more than twenty years in a men’s prison, over one consequential Fourth of July weekend—from the author of the PEN/Faulkner Award winner Delicious Foods.
Carlotta Mercedes has been misunderstood her entire life. When she was pulled into a robbery gone wrong, she still went by the name she’d grown up with in Fort Greene, Brooklyn—before it gentrified. But not long after her conviction, she took the name Carlotta and began to live as a woman, an embrace of selfhood that prison authorities rejected,…
You’ve all heard of the movie (and if you haven’t,
shame on you). So, as a book person, I’m
always interested in how close to the source these adaptations are. Boy, am I glad I read this? It was a true gift, like getting a bonus to
the movie.
First, the story of self-styled Texan cowboy Joe Buck,
eager to leave his dishwashing job to seek the glamorous life of New York City, was followed very closely to what you will find in the book. Joe has limited talents or skills to warrant
the life he envisions for himself in the city, so he decides to use his youth
and virility as a commodity.
This makes
sense to him since he has learned during his years in high school that his
sexual powers draw attention from women of all ages. Although he has been used and cast aside by
everyone after they obtain what they want, he thinks things will be different
in New York - where he will be the aggressor rather than the victim.
Unfortunately, the city turns out to be the
aggressor. Joe finds safety and camaraderie in the unlikely persona of
street hustler Ratso Rizzo (the greatest name in cinema).
But all this - the basis of the movie - doesn’t even
happen until the book's Second half. There is an entire second story at the beginning of Herlihy’s
novel. Even though the story takes place
after World War II, the message is timeless. The ‘bonus’ read shows Joe’s encounter with a
mysterious and predatory young man who offers to help Joe lose his virginity. Still, this enterprise is a foreshadowing of his later experience
away from home.
The basis for the Oscar–winning buddy film. “There is no questioning the rampant power achieved through shriveling, shattering scenes” (Kirkus Reviews).
Midnight Cowboy is considered by many to be one of the best American novels published since World War II. The main story centers around Joe Buck, a naive but eager and ambitious young Texan, who decides to leave his dead-end job in search of a grand and glamorous life he believes he will find in New York City. But the city turns out to be a much more difficult place to negotiate than Joe could ever have imagined. He…
This is a graphic novel. I don’t generally read graphic novels
(although I’ve been a rabid X-men and New Mutants collector since 1981), and I
do want to read Persepolis and Fun Home, but you try getting them from Library
waitlists - it’s not easy! But I heard a
lot of buzz about this series, which lives up to the hype.
What I enjoyed about this was the excellent inking
and art, but most important is the way the author uses elements of horror,
superhero, and speculation to find a new way to explain racism and prejudice as
a disease that turns its victims into brainless monsters.
The best books, from Twain to Morrison, to Faulkner,
to Baldwin, not only entertain us but also educate us and show us pieces of
ourselves we may have overlooked or taken for granted.
Bitter Root reminded me of my aunties and
uncles who have passed on. I didn’t
appreciate their wisdom and the magic of their cooking and home remedies when
I was an arrogant, know-it-all kid. I’m
glad the characters here are able to benefit from the knowledge of their
ancestors.
Once known as the greatest monster hunters of all time,
the Sangerye family specialized in curing the souls of those infected by hate,
but those days are fading. A terrible tragedy has claimed most of the family,
leaving the surviving cousins split between curing monsters and killing them.
Now, with a new breed of monster loose on the streets of Harlem, the Sangerye
family must come together, or watch the human race fall to untold
evil.
One day in 2010, in
Norristown, Pennsylvania, Bowie Long, still dressed in his pajamas, went to
visit his mother at work at the county administration building to ask her for his check from Social Security; then, for reasons
he doesn’t fully
understand, he tried to kill her.
Now he’s in a
state mental facility, where he’s never
been before: “The
state hospital was the place of last resort. The place for the true loons. Or
those who didn’t have
insurance to pay for anything else.
There were no perks here.” The 32-year-old
Bowie was diagnosed with bipolar disorder years ago and has long heard voices
in his head.
