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Lädt ... Southland (Original 2003; 2003. Auflage)von Nina Revoyr
Werk-InformationenSouthland von Nina Revoyr (2003)
Lädt ...
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Keine aktuelle Diskussion zu diesem Buch. i really liked this so much. it was so layered and about so many things, all of them interesting and worth talking about. i found it a little difficult to keep some of the characters and time periods straight in my head since we were going between the 40s (during wwii), the 60s (around and during the watts riots), and 1994 and were bouncing between two families, and so many perspectives. but i did really like the way she told this story, with so many different voices carrying it through. so many interesting characters, and the realistic and everyday tragedy that is not knowing someone of an older generation until it's too late, and learning about them after their death. seeing how much you could have gotten from a relationship with them once it's too late. the racism and how it was both the same and different when it was experienced by the japanese and the blacks. the internment camps - i don't think i've read fiction that takes place there before, and i learned a lot. there is so much nuance and sadness and violence and beauty in this book. i loved the characters of curtis and jimmy and jackie and frank. the immigrant stories, the racism faced by the japanese and the black families, the hiding of self that happens when you don't want to discuss your sexuality. the way the characters throughout history all had something to relate to others because of their histories and their treatment. (the way frank and alma understood what their families had gone through, even though it was so different, because it was all oppression and prejudice.) plus the murders and the figuring out of who did it. the murders were the backdrop of the story but not nearly the most interesting thing. the relationships and the histories, this is what made this book shine. the only problems i had with the book were even so, those aren't huge deals and this book overcomes them anyway. there is so much happening here that makes this book worthwhile. The story is interesting, the themes are definitely timely, and I enjoyed reading another novel about Los Angeles, but the execution is a bit clumsy. The exposition is obvious and some of the characters not entirely believable, as though intentionally "too much" in order to make a point. The juxtaposition of violence and sex is also a little off-putting to me. Still, I liked this novel enough that I'd be interested in checking out Revoyr's later work. 3.5 stars. Family saga, mystery, crime drama, with a bit of romance thrown in. After Frank Sakai's death, his daughter Lois finds an old will naming someone she doesn't know, and a box of memorabilia. She tasks her niece, Frank's granddaughter Jackie--with figuring out what it's about. Jackie learns a lot about her grandfather--his life when interred, his WW2 experiences, his store, his community (Angeles Mesa), his family, his friends. She also finds out all about what happened during the Watts riots. This book is interesting and worth the read, and I especially liked the real places referenced. I found the romance to be an odd distraction in the story--unless the idea was to contrast a current relationship with a historic relationship? « L’intrigue de Southland est de la trempe d’un James Ellroy ou d’un Walter Mosley. » Los Angeles Times Voici ce que vous pouvez lire au dos de ce livre. Vous vous dites, « rien que ça ?!! ». Mais pour une fois, les journalistes n’ont –pas trop- exagéré. Cependant Nina Revoyr nous la joue plutôt petite musique de nuit que grande symphonie pleine de bruits et de fureur, à l’image de ces immigrés japonais qui faisaient profil bas pour s’intégrer dans la société américaine d’après-guerre. Et je tire mon chapeau à la romancière pour attirer le lecteur dans ses filets, alors que le personnage principal, l’américano-japonaise, Jackie Ishida, étudiante en droit à Los Angeles, n’est pas spécialement accrocheur, comme pour marquer symboliquement son absence dans sa propre vie... Que le seul moment d’action est un quadruple meurtre non résolu en 1965, des adolescents noirs tués dans une épicerie dans le quartier de Crenshaw pendant les émeutes de Watts. D’où la force de ce roman, nous faire découvrir au travers de l’enquête sur ce meurtre qui se transforme en quête identitaire pour Jackie, la petite et de la grande histoire d’une ville aux mille visages alors qu’elle tente d’exécuter les dernières volontés testamentaires de son grand-père propriétaire de cette épicerie. « Fascinant et bouleversant (…) Une page essentielle de l’histoire de L.A. » L.A. Weekly. Encore bien vu, messieurs les journalistes ! Ainsi, découvrant pas à pas l’histoire de sa famille et le quartier populaire dont elle est issue, l’héroïne fait résonner les voix d’une population immigrée confrontée, de la Deuxième Guerre mondiale à nos jours, au racisme ordinaire. Nina Revoyr étant mi-américaine, mi-japonaise, j’attends avec curiosité le passage à un autre roman qui ne puiseraient pas dans ses propres racines pour confirmer son talent et sa sensibilité. keine Rezensionen | Rezension hinzufügen
"I'm an LA native with a lot of love for LA crime fiction, but instead of preaching to the noir choir aboutThe Long Goodbye, I'd like to gush aboutSouthland by Nina Revoyr. It's a brilliant, ambitious, moving literary crime novel about two families in South Los Angeles and their tangled history between the 1930s and the 1990s. The central mystery is the death of four black boys in a Japanese-American man's store during the Watts Rebellion of 1965. It's a powerful book, one that I think about often, as well as a huge influence on my work. Right up there with Chandler." --Stephanie Cha (of theLARB) inGQ on "The Greatest Crime Novelists on Their Favorite Crime Novels Ever" "Jackie Ishida's grandfather had a store in Watts where four boys were killed during the riots in 1965, a mystery she attempts to solve." --New York Times Book Review, Ross MacDonald on "Where Noir Lives in the City of Angels" "It is the kind of saga that often epitomizes and shocks LA--friction and violence between races and cultures." --Los Angeles Times, named one of the 20 Essential LA Crime Books "When I started working onYour House Will Pay, I hoped to write something that was half as smart and affecting asSouthland. Revoyr's novel takes place in the Crenshaw district of Los Angeles, following two families--one black, one Japanese--over several decades. It's a character-driven saga with the engine of a crime novel, unravelling a horrific multiple murder that took place in the chaotic days of the Watts Rebellion in 1965." --The Guardian (UK), one of Steph Cha's Top 10 Books About Trouble in Los Angeles "[A]n absolutely compelling story of family and racial tragedy. Revoyr's novel is honest in detailing southern California's brutal history, and honorable in showing how families survived with love and tenacity and dignity." --Susan Straight, author ofHighwire Moon Southlandbrings us a fascinating story of race, love, murder and history, against the backdrop of an ever-changing Los Angeles. A young Japanese-American woman, Jackie Ishida, is in her last semester of law school when her grandfather, Frank Sakai, dies unexpectedly. While trying to fulfill a request from his will, Jackie discovers that four African-American boys were killed in the store Frank owned during the Watts Riots of 1965. Along with James Lanier, a cousin of one of the victims, Jackie triesto piece together the story of the boys' deaths. In the process, she unearths the long-held secrets of her family's history. Southlanddepicts a young woman in the process of learning that her own history has bestowed upon her a deep obligation to be engaged in the larger world. And in Frank Sakai and his African-American friends, it presents characters who find significant common ground in their struggles, but who also engage each other across grounds--historical and cultural--that are still very much in dispute. Moving in and out of the past--from the internment camps of World War II, to the barley fields of the Crenshaw District in the 1930s, to the streets of Watts in the 1960s, to the night spots and garment factories of the 1990s--Southland weaves a tale of Los Angeles in all of its faces and forms. Keine Bibliotheksbeschreibungen gefunden. |
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Google Books — Lädt ... GenresMelvil Decimal System (DDC)813.54Literature English (North America) American fiction 20th Century 1945-1999Klassifikation der Library of Congress [LCC] (USA)BewertungDurchschnitt:
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The story did hold my interest, and an interesting setting, but at times I felt that Revoyr tried to do too much, and the story could have been told with fewer characters and details. The lesbian sup-plot seemed like an add-on that didn't add a lot.
I did like the historical detail. I was especially interested in the parts about the experience of Japanese American GI's. ( )