Xochitl Gonzalez

On a macro level, this is a novel about political unrest and revolution and race and oppression. On a micro level, Olga Dies Dreaming is novel about secrets, appearances, protection, loyalty, but, mostly, it’s about love. The love for family and culture and place. And the love between two semi-orphaned siblings who struggle to overcome a deep-seated need for a mother’s love and acceptance. Through their journey to overcome the absence of a mother’s love, Olga and Prieto deal with the individual compromises they make in pursuit of filling the hole left by their mother: Olga still trying to figure out who she wants to be and Prieto trying to figure out how to get back to who he used to be. Through it all, I was reminded of the existential warning: “Beware that, when fighting monsters, you yourself do not become a monster... for when you gaze long into the abyss. The abyss gazes also into you.”

I really love everything about this book: the dual setting of a changing, gentrified Brooklyn and of the hurricane-ravaged Caribbean island; the intriguing plot full of the larger political intricacies of the characters’ lives and of the smaller (but no less complicated) personal relationships and entanglements; and the rich, layered characters themselves—none completely free of fault or bound to judgement. I really wanted to fight for these characters: Olga and Prieto and Matteo. And my heart really hurt for the ones who left: Papi and Abuelita and Blanca—their mother, more myth than maternal figure. And it’s through Blanca, the revolutionary mother, who pushes the story forward through manipulative missives and eventually brings her children closure when they are finally able to see beyond the lore and understand: “‘It’s about not chasing an external ideal, not trying to fit someone else’s vision of you and instead building a community of people who simply accept you as you are’” (276).… (mehr)