Tom Fleming
Yunior School
This Is How You Lose Her
By Junot Díaz
Faber & Faber 211pp £12.99
Five years after the publication of his Pulitzer Prize-winning debut novel, The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao, Junot Díaz once more steps into the well-worn shoes of Yunior, his semi-autobiographical fictional counterpart who provided such a winning narrator for both Oscar Wao and the author’s first collection of stories, Drown (1996). Again we enter the familiar territory of Yunior’s life, so close to Díaz’s: his childhood in New Jersey as a poor Dominican immigrant, his relationship with his family (especially his mother), his love of sci-fi, and his complex dealings with women. Given that seven of the nine stories in this latest collection have been published already, in the New Yorker and elsewhere, it’s fair to say that, in more ways than one, this book does not break new ground.
Even if the terrain is familiar, however, it’s still a pleasure to be here. The stories in This Is How You Lose Her are vignettes from Yunior’s life, mostly involving women and related in his street-smart, slang-heavy Spanglish. The book could easily have taken its title from the final story
Sign Up to our newsletter
Receive free articles, highlights from the archive, news, details of prizes, and much more.@Lit_Review
Follow Literary Review on Twitter
Twitter Feed
Knowledge of Sufism increased markedly with the publication in 1964 of The Sufis, by Idries Shah. Nowadays his writings, much like his father’s, are dismissed for their Orientalism and inaccuracy.
@fitzmorrissey investigates who the Shahs really were.
Fitzroy Morrissey - Sufism Goes West
Fitzroy Morrissey: Sufism Goes West - Empire’s Son, Empire’s Orphan: The Fantastical Lives of Ikbal and Idries Shah by Nile Green
literaryreview.co.uk
Rats have plagued cities for centuries. But in Baltimore, researchers alighted on one surprising solution to the problem of rat infestation: more rats.
@WillWiles looks at what lessons can be learned from rat ecosystems – for both rats and humans.
Will Wiles - Puss Gets the Boot
Will Wiles: Puss Gets the Boot - Rat City: Overcrowding and Urban Derangement in the Rodent Universes of John B ...
literaryreview.co.uk
Twisters features destructive tempests and blockbuster action sequences.
@JonathanRomney asks what the real danger is in Lee Isaac Chung's disaster movie.
https://literaryreview.co.uk/eyes-of-the-storm