Drown

published	1997 by Riverhead Trade
binding	Paperback
isbn	1573226068 (isbn13: 9781573226066)
pages	224
setting	Dominican Republic
description	With ten stories that move from the barrios of the Dominican Republic to the struggling urban communities of New Jersey, Junot Diaz makes his remarkab...more [close] With ten stories that move from the barrios of the Dominican Republic to the struggling urban communities of New Jersey, Junot Diaz makes his remarkable debut. Diaz's work is unflinching and strong, and these stories crackle with an electric sense of discovery. Diaz evokes a world in which fathers are gone, mothers fight with grim determination for their families and themselves, and the next generation inherits the casual cruelty, devestating ambivalence, and knowing humor of lives circumscribed by poverty and uncertainty. In Drown, Diaz has harnessed the rhythms of anger and release, frustration and joy, to indelible effect.
date added	04-02-07 edit book

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Myfanwy rated it:

06/23/07

There are several recurrent themes running through this collection (the lost father, the regained father, the lost love, brotherhood, betrayal--often sexual) but the one I found most striking was that of facelessness.

You would think that facelessness is synonymous with invisibility, but here it is not. There is something within that facelessness, which makes the person all the more visible--scorned, pitied, hated, feared, and by some, treated with great kindness. The faced want the faceless...more There are several recurrent themes running through this collection (the lost father, the regained father, the lost love, brotherhood, betrayal--often sexual) but the one I found most striking was that of facelessness.

You would think that facelessness is synonymous with invisibility, but here it is not. There is something within that facelessness, which makes the person all the more visible--scorned, pitied, hated, feared, and by some, treated with great kindness. The faced want the faceless to be gone for good because they represent the worst fear: That you, too, might one day suffer this fate where all that defines you to the outside world is stripped away, where you are a stranger in a strange land--where you are unloved and unlovable.

"Ysrael" is the boy with no face, his face having been mostly chewed off by a pig when he was an infant. Because of this he wears a mask and awaits a humanitarian intervention in which doctors in Canada are meant to restore his face. But this day never seems to come and he is scorned and beaten, but he is also an object of intense interest. There is something about him that fascinates the other boys; if only they could just see behind his mask. But even when they do, it infuriates them, repulses them. There is nothing in seeing his face that makes them feel better about themselves. It only makes them feel worse, more powerless.

Then when the reader sees the world from his point of view in "No Face," we understand that though he is deformed and maligned there is still great hope and beauty in his world, though he might not realize it. There is something strong deep within that will keep him alive despite the obstacles. He is a survivor. He will run.

So Ysrael stands for the best hope of all of the faceless within these stories--and the message is to keep going, keep running, keep moving forward no matter how people will push you down and try to keep you from being seen.

In that, a book, which might otherwise be bleak, I found quite hopeful. And so, in the end, what you have is a collection of stories that are beautiful, necessary, and heartbreaking. Read it. ...less

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Paul rated it:

04/30/08

bookshelves: short-stories

As when you're listening to some old piece of music you never thought much of, it could be a long ago seemingly throwaway pop dance number like This Old Heart of Mine by the Isley Brothers, or some slyer more college-degreed album track like let's say Listening Wind by Talking Heads, and you suddenly jump up and think but - but really, this is a masterpiece! - it's not just another painting-by-numbers from Motown, it's not just another sneery too-clever construction you skip while you're trying ...more As when you're listening to some old piece of music you never thought much of, it could be a long ago seemingly throwaway pop dance number like This Old Heart of Mine by the Isley Brothers, or some slyer more college-degreed album track like let's say Listening Wind by Talking Heads, and you suddenly jump up and think but - but really, this is a masterpiece! - it's not just another painting-by-numbers from Motown, it's not just another sneery too-clever construction you skip while you're trying to find the one where David Byrne goes "And you may find yourself in a beautiful house! With a beautiful wife! And you may say to yourself How Did I Get Here?", Juno Diaz' tales from the front line of squalour and immigration aren't just another vicarious thrillseeking tour of Poverty and Ignorance Hell, not just another wound-baring stigmata-showing howl from yet more people from the abyss. They're that too, just like This Old Heart of Mine is a great dance number, but there's this thing called an authentic voice, or whatever the term is, which is the exact opposite of His Master's Voice (which was a record label and a painting). It's where no one but this particular author would know how to describe this person or that circumstance, this pain or that crime, the particular inside the generic.
The best story is the last and longest, but only because of what went before. Gloomily overhanging the earlier tales of kids trying to grow up in the Dominican Republic is the father who left for America, who never came back, and who stopped sending money, and who never sent for his family to join him. What a shit! We get used to the banal outrage of not knowing what this useless fool did when he got there, what was his big fat excuse, how could he abandon his wife and kids, etc etc so that there's a real frisson when we discover that the last 45 pages will answer all these questions, and in a great reversal of perspective, you find yourself looking out of this bad man's face, sleeping in his cockroach rooms and working his 16 hour shifts.
Great stuff, and not one wasted word. ...less

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Stace rated it:

(review of isbn 0571190634)

08/22/07

Read in July, 2007

recommends it for: Humans

I was lucky enough to have seen Junot Diaz read, and that cabròn was hilarious! His talk was fresh, lewd, direct, sly, sweet, and honest. Exactly like his writing. He spoke of how Hip Hop had informed his life and work, and how a writer must use experience to shape their art; auto-biography and fiction helix together. His street talk and easy manner reminded me of the slick Mexican kids I grew up with(with due respect for the differences in Latino cultures). No amount of vernacular speech coul...more

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Matt rated it:

09/19/07

Read in February, 2002

One of the coolest things that ever happened to me was I got to participate in a creative writing workshop with Junot Diaz. My girlfriend was in the class also, which was the first time we had a class together. We had been living together for a little while, and even though we were very much in love at the time, whe would do certain shit that really got on my nerves, like for example always being late (as in over an hour late!) for everything. So on the first day of class, she came in (predictab...more

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Ms. added it (review of isbn 0571190634)

04/19/07

bookshelves: domincanrepublic

From Publishers Weekly

The 10 tales in this intense debut collection plunge us into the emotional lives of people redefining their American identity. Narrated by adolescent Dominican males living in the struggling communities of the Dominican Republic, New York and New Jersey, these stories chronicle their outwardly cool but inwardly anguished attempts to recreate themselves in the midst of eroding family structures and their own burgeoning sexuality. The best pieces, such as "Aguantando...more

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Erin rated it:

04/26/08

This is the first book I've read for pleasure in quite awhile. I raced through it, read the whole the thing in about 24 hours. Usually books of short stories take me awhile because I never quite engage with the characters, but these stories are connected by a single narrator and a cast of recurring characters. I might argue that the book is really a novel, not short stories, but that's neither here nore there. The narration just pulls you in and the manner in which he describes life that is ...more

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Daniel rated it:

05/12/08

Read in May, 2008

WOW! Just freaking wow!!!

I picked this book up because I enjoyed The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao. When I started to read it, I thought that this felt like a handful of failed starts to similar novels. But the further that I read into it, the more I realized what it was that Junot Diaz was doing, painting a complete picture out of multiple fractured pieces.

The writing in this book is remarkably sparse, short with details and full of space where you are asked to interject your own im...more

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Kevin rated it:

01/21/08

Read in January, 2008

Diaz's stories provide a glimpse into the struggles - economic, familial, emotional - of poor/working-class immigrants. The stories are gritty and dripping with realism. The stories are not packed with insights, but when the story telling is this good, the description alone is enough.

Drown is the anti-Jesus' Son. The prospect of success hovers over virtually every story in this collection. Maybe "success" is just a myth, but the characters in Drown suffer for it nonetheless. The ch...more

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Lavina rated it:

09/07/07

bookshelves: 2007, fiction, short-stories_novellas

Read in September, 2007

Seeing Junot Díaz read from his new novel the other night reminded me of how I've been wanting to read this collection for years. In person he is charismatic, opinionated, humble, and full of wit (and so personable!). He reads from his own writing in staccato (and says that if you read Tolkien aloud, you'll find that it sounds "bananas"), and follows his commentary with a self-conscious "yeah?" (as in, "you agree with me . . . right?") -- which is interesting becau...more

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Mariela rated it:

04/17/08

Read in April, 2008

i picked up this book because i really wanted to read "the brief wondrous life" but it was still in hardcover. drown it was, and i loved it. it's not this terribly deep read. what it definitely is is a very realistic account of the immigrant experience, in this case, the dominican experience. diaz creates very vivid and memorable characters surviving in harsh conditions in their homeland or in the promised land of the U.S. because the characters appear across most stories, you end...more

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Nora rated it:

11/19/07

Junot Diaz is flat out one of the best "young writers" writing today. There is no room for arguments; I will take no dissenting voices into my ears, into my consciousness. No. This collection of short stories was so engaging, so vivid and palpable (it's one of those books that would be called 'colorful' by middle aged liberal suburban librarians "a colorful and exciting series of short stories about the Dominican and New Jersey and the places in between"). The characters ...more

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James rated it:

04/01/08

bookshelves: short-stories-and-stuff

Read in April, 2008

recommended to James by: Francisco
recommends it for: Short Story lovers

It really deserves a 3 1/2 but alas, goodreads allows for no middle ground. I felt the stories were well crafted and had some great moments in them...but not all of them resonated with me. The first story is the best in my opinion. He hits all the right notes and by the end your aching. The rest of the stories were very well written, but just didn't have the emotional heft...there were some spectacular images that really came through in several of the endings. It was like he was saving the right...more

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Robb rated it:

09/21/07

Read in September, 2007

It's like, mostly what I think is good about this book has to do with its voices and their honesty (which should read: particularity). But also, the way that larger kinds of social history play out in the context of this one person's life--it's like the sort of thing that happens in, say, <em>Invisible Man</em>, where there's the Harlem riots, and there's the (Second? Third?) Migration happening, but it's all happening around the bildungsroman dealing with this really present 'I' n...more

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Courtney rated it:

01/25/08

I love Junot Diaz, wholly and absolutely. I actually bought this book when I was in high school, and I was in my 'judge a book by it's cover' phase of choosing and reading books. I didn't read it though until his story 'Wildwood' (soooooooooo good, and illustrated by Jamie Hernandez! Love!) in the New Yorker summer fiction issue. They're fantastic short stories. When he spoke at the New Yorker festival, he said these stories weren't necessarily autobiographical, only because he couldn't fit all ...more

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Lynn rated it:

10/12/07

Read in January, 2007

recommends it for: everyone

Found this on our bookshelves. Can't put it down.

BTW, Diaz has a novel out now, reviewed in this week's NY Times book review.

This was as great as everyone says. Reading it is like a vacation to a place where you meet a lot of local people who are interesting. The twist here is that I at least really don't want to hang with the characters in these stories - the drug dealers and junkies and low-wage workers who in general and understandably don't have much in common or much sympathy with s...more

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Noriko rated it:

04/01/08

Read in January, 2004

The contrast between the simple, beautiful language and the complexity of these stories made me want to stay with each piece for as long as possible. My favorite, I think, was "Drown" for the way he draws parallels between the narrator's current stifling and unpromising situation and the uncomfortable betrayal of a best friend. I really enjoyed the recurring characters such as Yunior and the rest of his family. I would have loved a whole novel with these characters. The stories tak...more

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Mark rated it:

08/27/07

recommends it for: all

Ten years ago I dismissed this book out of sheer jealousy but read it at the urging of a friend. Surprisingly, I liked it (not all of it but enough) despite its sparse, clipped style which had all the earmarks of the typical MFA/Creative Writer workshop style that I find nauseating to most contemporary American fiction but this struck home. I especially found the last chapter--perhaps the most un-literary of all chapters--the most moving. I would compare this too Danilo Kis's Garden, Ashes in th...more

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David rated it:

06/30/07

Read in December, 2007

It's a little difficult for me to pinpoint exactly why I like this book so much. I'm afraid that my Dominican background has colored my opinion of it, somewhat. However, I must say that the writing structure and style Diaz uses has captured my attention in every story. The best way I can describe it for now is minimalist, but he does very interesting things like never using quotation marks, and writing almost entirely in the first person. After I finish this book and look up more information...more

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Chris rated it:

10/30/07

bookshelves: already-read

Read in September, 2007

recommends it for: anyone who likes something different

I learned many things in this book......even though my family is all mainly from the Dominican Rep. there are things i didnt know about it because im usually visiting but the culture is way different from the United States.Also there are many different stories in the book taking place from Dominican Republic to New Jersey overall i liked it because it kept me wanting to know more and wanting to know whats going to happen next.
I do recommend this book to anyone who likes reading these types of ...more

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Bleattlersm rated it:

02/02/08

This collection of short stories was included with the CD The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao. I had a hard time following it on CD since there didn't seem to be a very clear distinction between when one story ended and another began. The language selection and style of writing is a bit crass, but this seems to add to the authentic feel of the stories. It feels more like an aquantance is relaying a story to you than like you are reading a book. It was an interesting view into a culture differen...more

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