Revisit Week: Out of Darkness by Ashley Hope Pérez

Carolrhoda Lab
Published Sept 1st, 2015
402 Pages

New London, Texas. 1937. Naomi Vargas and Wash Fuller know about the lines in East Texas as well as anyone. They know the signs that mark them.

“No Negroes, Mexicans, or dogs.”

They know the people who enforce them.

But sometimes the attraction between two people is so powerful it breaks through even the most entrenched color lines. And the consequences can be explosive. – Goodreads

This review will be less of a review but more of an emotional rant. I read this book when it was first released and it is still one of the most heart wrenching, emotional, empty out your tear ducts books I have ever read.

This book messed me up between anger and wtheck moments, I couldn’t put it down despite the emotional wreck I became. Ms. Perez created a realistic (that you cannot tell me is true in some form of way) story using historical references to tell a tale about a Mexican girl, her family and a black boy who falls for her. As simple as that description is that isn’t the whole story.

See the thing is there are some Mexicans that can pass for white and there are others who cannot. Ms. Perez made that “forbidden” topic such a big part in this book without actually saying it. I chalk this up to amazing writing. She was able to put so much into this book without slapping you in the face with it.

There was a sense of vulnerability within this book. It felt honest and open, which is why it touched me so much. The pace was perfect. You didn’t feel like you was missing something or that Ms. Perez was stretching the novel.

It was real from beginning to the most heartbreaking end, I have ever had to read. I thought this book was going to be extremely generic when I first started it but that thought quickly went away.

I highly recommend this book. Will I read it again? Probably not because I remember every details and I am emotional when I think about it.

Overall

5 Pickles. 

NetGalley Review: The Language of Dying by Sarah Pinborough

Jo Fletcher Books
Originally Published 2009
144 Pages

A woman watches her father take his last breathes and while doing so, she relives the past week and thinks about what brought her family together and what tore them apart. As the middle child in a family of five, she has secrets; one in particularly that keeps her at her childhood home and that keeps her waiting for the darkness. 

*Short review for a short novel*

Dangggg Tanya, what’s with you and these short stories?!!? I know I have said constantly that I do not enjoy short stories and yet I keep reading them. I don’t know why I do it but I do it.

So anyway, I actually really like Ms. Pinborough’s writing, which is why I requested this book. She can paint a pretty picture or in this case a chilling picture.

I liked this short read but I did feel it was very dull and drawn out. This feeling had nothing to do with the fact that from beginning to end, we are waiting for a man to die. It comes from the lack of color from the narrator or even the other characters. I did not expect it in present time but more so from the past. It was even hinted at one point but the that was it. I get the whole point of this book is to be despair but some kind of life would have made this book perfect and much more chilling.

Beyond, this I liked the creativity shown in this book. I like what the author was able to draw out of the story and I really loved how she made this much bigger than simply a daughter watching her father die alone. There is so much depth to this 144 page story, you can’t help but be in awe.

The pace could be improved but I am not complaining that much. Overall,

3 Pickles