South by South Bronx - Softcover

Rodriguez, Abraham

Softcover

ISBN 10: 1933354569 ISBN 13: 9781933354569

Publisher: Akashic Books, Ltd., 2008

Synopsis

Powerful. . . . A redemptive and absorbing work.” The New York Times Book Review, on Spidertown

Scary, sexy, exuberant. . . . Rodriguez has seized a truth of our times . . . and given us a crackling good read.” Los Angeles Times Book Review, on Spidertown

Rodriguez uses the repetitiveness of life in the ghetto itself to make the tension and desperation of Spidertown achingly palpable.” People, on Spidertown

A joy to read! Rodriguez’s writing has never been more accomplished, more lyrical, more trenchant, or more humane. In these pages you will find marvels, but also a young man writing with the ferocity of life itself.” Junot Díaz, on The Buddha Book

When Puerto Rican ladies’ man Alex awakes one morning to find a mysterious woman in his bed, he assumes he’s suffered another embarrassing blackout. He soon learns, however, that Ava is no one-night stand in fact, he’s never met her before. As her story begins to unfold and her reason for appearing in his bed emerges, it is not just Alex’s life that she risks, nor her own, but the entire character of the South Bronx.

Abraham Rodriguez, Jr. was born and raised in the South Bronx. His first book, The Boy without a Flag, was a 1993 New York Times Notable Book of the Year. His novel Spidertown won a 1995 American Book Award and was optioned by Columbia Pictures. His most recent novel, The Buddha Book, was published by Picador in 2001. He currently lives in Berlin, Germany.

About this title

About the Author:

Abraham Rodriguez, Jr. was born and raised in the South Bronx. His first book, The Boy without a Flag, was a 1993 New York Times Notable Book of the Year. His novel Spidertown won a 1995 American Book Award and was optioned by Columbia Pictures. His latest novel, The Buddha Book, was published by Picador in 2001.

From Booklist:

An alcoholic lothario shoe salesman wakes up with a cute woman in his bed. Where did she come from? Monk and Mink are a writer and a painter, respectively, who rode a wave of Hispanic-chic in the arts until the wave broke; now Monk has disappeared. Sanchez is a South Bronx detective on the outs for nailing some vigilante cops for a string of murders. Today the feds arrive and ask for his help in finding Spook, a drug dealer hired by a terrorist group to launder $10 million. Since Spook didn’t make that last deposit, the feds have lost the money trail. Rodriguez, winner of an American Book Award in 1995 for Spidertown, shifts narrative perspective constantly, moving from Alex the alcoholic to the woman in his bed to Mink and sometimes to Sanchez as first-person narrator. Initially, readers will be challenged by seemingly unconnected vignettes and characters, but Rodriguez teasingly pulls them together until eventually we have a poetic thriller in which the body count rises as the painfully self-aware Sanchez balances duty versus survival. A very different and rewarding mystery. --Wes Lukowsky

About this edition

• Publisher: Akashic Books, Ltd.
• Publication date: 2008
• ISBN 10: 1933354569
• ISBN 13: 9781933354569
• Binding: Paperback
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 350