- Malia Zaidi
Saturday Spotlight: America Is Not the Heart by Elaine Castillo
Every week I am going to do a weekend spotlight post focusing on the work of an indie or debut author or a book I think deserves more attention. As some of you may have read, Amazon and Goodreads are becoming a little less hospitable places for indie and new authors, and I think it is important to continue to promote new talent and get the word out. Sometimes it's difficult to read indie books, because you may simply not have heard of them, so I hope this post will introduce you to some new authors and some interesting reading material!
This week I am featuring America Is Not the Heart by Elaine Castillo.
"How many lives can one person lead in a single lifetime? When Hero de Vera arrives in America, disowned by her parents in the Philippines, she's already on her third. Her uncle, Pol, who has offered her a fresh start and a place to stay in the Bay Area, knows not to ask about her past. And his younger wife, Paz, has learned enough about the might and secrecy of the De Vera family to keep her head down. Only their daughter Roni asks Hero why her hands seem to constantly ache.Illuminating the violent political history of the Philippines in the 1980s and 1990s and the insular immigrant communities that spring up in the suburban United States with an uncanny ear for the unspoken intimacies and pain that get buried by the duties of everyday life and family ritual, Castillo delivers a powerful, increasingly relevant novel about the promise of the American dream and the unshakable power of the past. In a voice as immediate and startling as those of Junot Diaz and NoViolet Bulawayo, America Is Not the Heart is a sprawling, soulful telenovela of a debut novel. With exuberance, muscularity, and tenderness, here is a family saga; an origin story; a romance; a narrative of two nations and the people who leave home to grasp at another, sometimes turning back."
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