American Dirt by Jeanine Cummins is contemporary fiction about current situations. In fact, the criticism of the novel is that the author isn't "brown" enough, or "Hispanic" enough, or too middle class and has used the current issues to make money on a story.
All of which sounds like jealousy. I also get asked after I've read one of my stories, "Did that really happen?", or "How did you react?", or "What did you do?" ? And when I respond that the story is a story, IOW, fiction, everyone is disappointed or dismisses my work as unworthy of consideration.
Some of our best stories were written by people who weren't part of the story but were around when the events happened. I'm thinking of Leo Tolstoy's, War and Peace, and Harriet Beecher Stowe's Uncle Tom's Cabin. Tolstoy was not a soldier and Harriet Beecher Stowe was not a slave nor a slave owner.
This novel took me by surprise. If you had told me that it was about immigration, I wouldn't have been interested. But American Dirt is this month's selection in one of my book clubs. From the first sentence, I was interested. Let me correct myself. I was riveted. I stayed up too late, reading it. I thought about it all day and couldn't wait to get back home. It is a page-turner.
I learned a lot about politics, human nature, Isaac Newton's Fourth Law of Motion, immigration, geography, morality, and hope. I am not going to give you a book summary because I was given a story summary and was not interested in that type of book. The only reason I picked up the book, was because it was next on the list for my book club. It is mesmerizing. I challenge you to read ten pages. If you are human, you will continue to read until you complete the book--with a sigh of relief and satisfaction.
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