A review by madtraveler
Lot: Stories by Bryan Washington

2.0

Talented writer for sure and perhaps just not the book for me. Some compare this to jazz -- I actually mostly like jazz but I get why a lot of listeners can't go with it. That's where I am at with these stories. It IS a short story collection so perhaps the fact that most of the stories have the same characters and a few others are scattered throughout, this feels like a disjointed, meandering-plot novel (and there are books like this that claim to be a novel). So that's perhaps an unfortunate side effect. The characters were not memorable for me but I didn't give up on it either. Bleak and demoralizing. Gritty for sure and that grittiness is no doubt quite real. I lived in Houston and taught in Baytown, and while this is a side of it (minority/immigrant/poor-struggling) I only experienced marginally via my students in Baytown, I get it and know this is truth. But other than the heat and particular street references it really could have been any big city. I will give his latest novel a look. **See also the Joe Valdez review below... **