Klik på en miniature for at gå til Google Books
Indlæser... Dominicana: A Novel (udgave 2019)af Angie Cruz (Forfatter)
Work InformationDominicana af Angie Cruz
Books Read in 2020 (193) » 6 mere Indlæser...
Bliv medlem af LibraryThing for at finde ud af, om du vil kunne lide denne bog. Der er ingen diskussionstråde på Snak om denne bog. Although Ana isn't exactly keen on marrying at fifteen to a man she is barely acquainted with, she knows full well that her Dominican family is counting on her to make their own aspirations a reality. If she marries Juan Ruiz, he'll take her to New York, where she will eventually be able to send for the rest of her family. As far as husbands go, Juan isn't awful, but neither is he warm or loving...and he has a bit of a temper. Ana's life in the vibrant city of New York is more isolated and lonely than she had expected. It took me a chapter or two to really get into the narrative, but then suddenly I was sucked in for good and couldn't put it down. The story, characters, conversations, circumstances, heartbreak — everything felt so real, and the writing was wonderfully done. That this book was based on the author's mother's life and experiences made it feel all the more meaningful. 4.5⭐️ (Book: 4⭐️ ; Audio Narration: 5⭐️) "Take the needle to the thread. Not the other way around. That’s the secret. Always yield to the needle because it’s inflexible. It’s the secret with people too. If a person seems inflexible, yield, then slip in sideways and get what you want." Newly married to a much older man, fifteen-year-old Ana Cancion moves to New York from her home in the Dominican Republic in January 1965. We follow Ana as she tries to make sense of her new situation- a new country, new language and culture very different from the one she has been accustomed to. Her husband Juan who is both emotionally and physically abusive does not make it easy for her. Ana is young, innocent and naïve in the ways of the world but she is aware of the enormous responsibility she carries on her shoulders- the responsibility of her family back home who expect her to help them move to America once she has settled in. Only when her husband Juan travels back to the Dominican Republic for a short interval to due to business-related issues does Ana get the opportunity to experience life in her new country- learning the language, starting her own little venture selling homemade delicacies, making friends and bonding with her brother-in-law Cesar. Torn between her duties toward her family and her own happiness, Ana will have to make a choice that would determine the trajectory of her future. Dominicana by Angie Cruz is a well-written story about a young immigrant girl who finds a way to cope with an unfavorable situation with hope, resilience and determination. The author mentions that she drew inspiration for this story from her mother’s life. Ana is smart and learns from observing the people and places around her. Not all her experiences are happy ones , but Ana does not give up. Though there are intense and disturbing moments in the narrative the author balances the heavy parties with moments of hope. I loved Ana’s joy at her new experiences in the city. While I rooted for Ana from the very beginning and enjoyed seeing her evolve into a stronger character, I did feel that the end was a bit rushed. I won’t say that this was a happy story but I am glad that it ends on a hopeful note. I paired the book with the exceptional audio narration by Coral Peña which definitely elevated my reading experience. I absolutely loved Angie Cruz’s How Not To Drown in a Glass of Water and I couldn’t wait to pick up more of her work. Though not as good as How Not To Drown in a Glass of Water, Dominicana does not disappoint! Book Club 5/8/23 El último día de 1964, la quinceañera Ana Canción se casa con Juan Ruiz, un hombre veinte años mayor que ella, en el campo dominicano. Al día siguiente se vuelve Ana Ruiz, una esposa confinada a un apartamento de un cuarto en Washington Heights. Juan la engaña, abusa y controla, hasta le prohíbe aprender inglés. Después de un intento fallido de fuga, Ana se entera de que está embarazada. Su madre y su esposo comparan su embarazo a ganar la lotería, su niña tendrá ciudadanía estadounidense. Juan vuelve a la República Dominicana cuando la guerra civil comienza, dejando a César, su hermano, cuidando a Ana. Durante ese descanso del confinamiento ella se enamora genuinamente, lo cual despierta su voluntad de pelear por independizarse de su abusador y por su derecho de permanecer en su patria adoptiva. Un retrato atemporal de feminidad y ciudadanía, que sigue vigente en esta época de migración forzada. When Juan Ruiz marries Ana Canción, he takes her from Los Guayacanos, Dominican Republic, to New York City on New Year’s Day, 1965. That might be unremarkable, except that Ana is only fifteen, while he’s thirty-two and has been lusting after her for at least four years. Never mind that Ana doesn’t love him or that Juan wears his machismo like armor, with all that implies about his prerogatives, self-regard, and definition of marital duties. But he’s a hard worker, Ana’s mother believes, and a big thinker. Besides, what Ana wants doesn’t matter. Mamá plans to get off the island, escaping its poverty, dead-end future, and corrupt, leeching dictatorship. Ana will get free herself, then be her mother’s (and siblings’) ticket to New York. So that’s settled. The central symbol of this engaging, heart-rending novel is Dominicana, the ceramic doll that Juan buys Ana at the Santo Domingo airport, and which Ana keeps in their apartment in Washington Heights, upper Manhattan. It’s the first and practically the last gift he buys her. Oh, he provides a few dresses, but nothing like the wardrobe she needs; just enough to look nice for him. Ana fixes his favorite Dominican foods — she’s an excellent cook — while he buys Chef Boyardee for her. And though he can go anywhere he wants, anytime, with anyone, let Juan find out that she’s walked to the corner store, and he’ll slap her face. Though Cruz never calls attention to what the doll represents, it clearly stands for her identity as a Dominican and her quick, brutal, much-too-early transition from childhood to womanhood in a strange, frightening city. The doll reminds Ana of who she is, and the family she’s left behind. Most important, Dominicana is Ana herself, for what is she to Juan but a faceless doll, a possession to use as he wills, or to show off to his friends? However, to Ana, Dominicana also has a practical purpose, as a hiding place for the money she manages to earn on the sly. For Mamá, though she’s pimped her own daughter and been controlling, nasty, and cruelly withholding, has instilled one lesson in her Ana’s head. Smile at your husband and his friends, she says; be the perfect wife in all ways. But don’t forget to demand what you want, and to work around him to get something for yourself. As she has often told Ana, men can only perform like men “when women are doing everything. We’re invisible little workers so they can puff out their chests.” That lesson saves Ana. It also prevents the novel from becoming a tale of unremitting masochism, a catalog of Juan’s bad behavior and his child bride’s helplessness, with no hope permitted (and no reason to keep reading). But Ana, though she gets burned a couple times trusting the wrong people, keeps looking for ways to grow. And when a coup erupts in the Dominican Republic—manipulated by the United States government, which sends troops—Juan leaves to try to secure his business interests on the island. That respite is what Ana’s been waiting for. She shows remarkable energy, spirit, and courage in seizing her chance, aided by Juan’s brother, César, who’s everything her husband is not. Yet though Dominicana is a shorter book than the number of pages suggests, Cruz is properly careful not to push the envelope too far. Ana remains young, scared, and confused about what she wants or can be allowed to want. There’s no Hollywood transformation, complete with shimmering images and everybody applauding at how she’s grown. Besides, she’s no fool; Juan won’t be gone forever. I like how Cruz weaves external events into the narrative. The coup naturally commands Ana’s attention the most, but there’s also Malcolm X’s murder, the World’s Fair, baseball, and, in the background, Vietnam. To this ex-New Yorker, who lived six months in Washington Heights (though twenty years after the action here), the city sings a familiar song. The story can be hard to follow at times, because of the very brief, episodic chapters, especially when thoughts and spoken words blend for want of quotation marks. I also want the narrative to linger longer at key emotional transitions toward the end. Even so, Dominicana’s a terrific book and a necessary, important story about what immigrant life is really like. ingen anmeldelser | tilføj en anmeldelse
HæderspriserDistinctionsNotable Lists
Fiction.
Literature.
HTML: A GOOD MORNING AMERICA COVER TO COVER BOOK CLUB PICK No library descriptions found. |
Current DiscussionsIngenPopulære omslag
Google Books — Indlæser... GenrerMelvil Decimal System (DDC)813.6Literature English (North America) American fiction 21st CenturyLC-klassificeringVurderingGennemsnit:
Er det dig?Bliv LibraryThing-forfatter. |
Anyone who picks up this book will fall in love with it and with Angie Curz. Bravo! Ms. Cruz left me wanting more. ( )