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A review by ridgewaygirl
Brass by Xhenet Aliu
5.0
In the decaying factory town of Waterbury, Connecticut, a young Lithuanian American girl gets a job as a waitress at the Betsy Ross diner. Her mother's an alcoholic, her younger sister has the brains and grades to get out of Waterbury, and Elsie's just hoping for a better life. Instead, she meets Bashkim, newly emigrated from Albania, where he left his wife behind in the hopes of a better life in the US.
A generation later, Elsie's daughter, Luljeta, also hopes for a better life somewhere else, but a rejection letter from the university she'd pinned her hopes on have her scrambling to find a reason to believe that she can make a better life for herself than the low income grind she has with her mother. Lulu goes in search of the father her mother won't talk about.
This may be a debut novel, but it's self-assured and well-written. Xhenet Aliu has managed something even seasoned authors struggle with; her two narrators sound different, but subtly so. She also writes with a dry humor and keen eye for detail. The characters inhabit a vivid, if run-down world and there's a lot of detail as to the cultural and social structures of the immigrant communities Lulu and Elsie live in, as well as the realities of always having to scramble to make the rent payment. I was impressed by this novel, loved that it shed light on people and places not usually given attention.
The addition of your mother's boyfriend, the postanarchist Professor Robbie, brings the total number of guests gathered for Christmas dinner to five, one more than the quartet of you, your mother, Mamie, and Greta, which had gathered for Thanksgiving and all other previous holidays you've sat through your entire life. Even with the addition of a Y chromosome, your Noel looks mostly like a nativity scene staged by a militant women's separatist group.
A generation later, Elsie's daughter, Luljeta, also hopes for a better life somewhere else, but a rejection letter from the university she'd pinned her hopes on have her scrambling to find a reason to believe that she can make a better life for herself than the low income grind she has with her mother. Lulu goes in search of the father her mother won't talk about.
This may be a debut novel, but it's self-assured and well-written. Xhenet Aliu has managed something even seasoned authors struggle with; her two narrators sound different, but subtly so. She also writes with a dry humor and keen eye for detail. The characters inhabit a vivid, if run-down world and there's a lot of detail as to the cultural and social structures of the immigrant communities Lulu and Elsie live in, as well as the realities of always having to scramble to make the rent payment. I was impressed by this novel, loved that it shed light on people and places not usually given attention.
The addition of your mother's boyfriend, the postanarchist Professor Robbie, brings the total number of guests gathered for Christmas dinner to five, one more than the quartet of you, your mother, Mamie, and Greta, which had gathered for Thanksgiving and all other previous holidays you've sat through your entire life. Even with the addition of a Y chromosome, your Noel looks mostly like a nativity scene staged by a militant women's separatist group.