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Nosotros Los Animales (2012)

by Justin Torres(Favorite Author)

3.59 of 5 Votes: 1

languge

English

genre

Fiction

publisher

Mondadori

review 1: I was really torn on how to rate this book. as a writer, I know we have all written both crappy and brilliant pieces. I appreciate the artistic fluidity the author was trying to acheive. I also appreciate his attempt to reveal a bit of the ugly in family relationships, especially if one member is different. Your family will not always embrace your flaws. I hate, hate, hate, hate the use of so many damned commas (pun). I didn't like that the story dwelled so much on the (slow to build) childhood and then sudden the rush to young adulthood. I felt almost robbed of the transition as it wasn't exactly spelled out until the Niagara chapter. I gave a three for the artistic value, but I couldn't give the last two because I finished disappointed.
review 2: First off, ... moreI should tell you now that I am super analytical in my reading; I feel that every word, chapter, scene, carries much more weight than the words on the page because writing is a torturous endeavor (ask any author). With that said... This book is a very quick read that has a lot packed into it. My biggest problem, one that I seem to have with too many Latino (male) authors, is the portrayal of their mothers. This particular book reminded me too much of Piri Thomas' mother in Down These Mean Streets, and the mothers in Junot Diaz' short story, Drown, in his collection of short stories by the same name. These mothers are written as these needy women who will always need a man- be it there husbands/boyfriends, or son, to prevent them from shattering into a million pieces. In We The Animals, there's a scene where the whole family goes for a swim, and the mother and her youngest are the only ones who can't swim. The mom needs the father around to have something to "hold on to". When the dad leaves them both to fend for themselves the mother starts to drown and claws at her son to get to the surface. This idea that the mother needs her children or husband to keep her head above has become redundant in these books. All the faults of the mother are amplified, while the dad's transgressions are minimized, but yet his actions are the ones that should be the most scaring. The mother does the best she can out of a shitty situation. She's always there for her kids, even when she's at her lowest. The father, however, constantly abandons them, is always sabotaging his family's chance at a better life, and yet those instances in the book are written just to give context to the mother's neediness, her shortcomings, and failures. Don't get me wrong, I'm fully aware that there are situations where a mother can fail her children, I'm not saying it's not possible. What I am saying is that, in stories where you have both parents present, the authors will voice their grievances with their mothers aggressively, while the father's faults are chalked up to a "boys will be boys" mentality. Its come to the point where I'm growing tired of reading books, particularly fictional auto-biographies, that are written by male Latino authors. I hope to be pleasantly surprised one day. less

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Reviews (see all)

krzsgo

I wanted to like this book. After the first 30 pages I thought I really would, but when I got to page 35 and there was still no kind of distinction between the brothers I began to lose hope. The brothers stay a lump unit with no real distinction between them for at least the first half of the novel. The only characters with any real substance were the parents. Also the ending just kind of came out of nowhere, there was no real showing that the character was getting any older and then suddenly he was no longer 7! There was very little character progression up to that point and then suddenly everything is suddenly completely different. All that being said though the writing was at least pretty and some of the earlier vignettes were very poignant.

OLATEX

Readers seem to react strongly to this book - with strong ratings and words at both ends of the spectrum. I found it to be a fast read with a consistent, descriptive, guttural style up until the final chapter. Like other reviewers, I felt the ending came a bit abruptly and was a bit of a non sequitur. Regardless, the author pulled me in with the narrator's authentic voice and brutal, wide-eyed descriptions of growing up amidst chaos and dysfunction.

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