Soledad

'Nobody's ever really given us such a revealing look at New York's Dominican population before . . . Cruz, in this determinedly real yet often magical novel, offers canny insights into family life' LA Times

At eighteen, Soledad couldn't get away fast enough from her contentious family with their endless tragedies and petty fights. Two years later, she's an art student at Cooper Union with a gallery job and a hip East Village walk-up. But when Tia Gorda calls with the news that Soledad's mother has lapsed into an emotional coma, she insists that Soledad's return is the only cure. Fighting the memories of open hydrants, leering men, and slick-skinned teen girls with raunchy mouths and snapping gum, Soledad moves home to West 164th Street. As she tries to tame her cousin Flaca's raucous behaviour and to resist falling for Richie - a soulful, intense man from the neighbourhood - she also faces the greatest challenge of her life: confronting the ghosts from her mother's past and salvaging their damaged relationship.

Evocative and wise, Soledad is a wondrous story of culture and chaos, family and integrity, myth and mysticism, from a Latina literary light.

“A vivid, breathing cityscape teeming with raw beauty, danger, and magic”

San Francisco Chronicle
Nobody's ever really given us such a revealing look at New York's Dominican population before . . . Cruz, in this determinedly real yet often magical novel, offers canny insights into family life LA Times
Tinted with the magical realism of Gabriel García Márquez, Cruz's first novel is that of man and woman, selective amnesia and persistent memories, redemption and survival Boston Globe

Angie Cruz is the author of the novels Soledad, Let It Rain Coffee, a finalist in 2007 for the IMPAC Dublin Literary Award., and Dominicana, which was shortlisted for the Women's Prize for Fiction 2020. She has published work in the New York Times, VQR, Gulf Coast Literary Journal, and other publications, and has received fellowships from the New York Foundation of the Arts, Yaddo, and the MacDowell Colony. She is founder and editor in chief of Aster(ix), a literary and arts journal, and is an associate professor of English at the University of Pittsburgh.

'Nobody's ever really given us such a revealing look at New York's Dominican population before . . . Cruz, in this determinedly real yet often magical novel, offers canny insights into family life' LA Times At eighteen, Soledad couldn't get away fast enough from her contentious family with their endless tragedies and petty fights. Two years later, she's an art student at Cooper Union with a gallery job and a hip East Village walk-up. But when Tia Gorda calls with the news that Soledad's mother has lapsed into an emotional coma, she insists that Soledad's return is the only cure. Fighting the memories of open hydrants, leering men, and slick-skinned teen girls with raunchy mouths and snapping gum, Soledad moves home to West 164th Street. As she tries to tame her cousin Flaca's raucous behaviour and to resist falling for Richie - a soulful, intense man from the neighbourhood - she also faces the greatest challenge of her life: confronting the ghosts from her mother's past and salvaging their damaged relationship.Evocative and wise, Soledad is a wondrous story of culture and chaos, family and integrity, myth and mysticism, from a Latina literary light.

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