Arlene McKanic

It’s not often a contemporary novel is narrated by an inanimate object. In the 18th century, this convention was quite a bit more popular, referred to as “it-narratives” or “object narratives.” Francesca Momplaisir takes this classic form and combines it with contemporary issues in My Mother’s House, narrated by the titular dwelling.

When we first meet the house, called La Kay, it is describing its own suicide by fire. La Kay wants to burn itself down because of a man named Lucien. Decades before the fire, Haitian immigrant Lucien moved to Queens, New York, with his young wife, Marie-Ange. Now she is dead, and Lucien, elderly and frail, is estranged from their three daughters. Amid the fire, Lucien swears that “his girls” are in the house’s fireproof safe room. Is Lucien mistaken in his addled state?

Though we first meet Lucien when he’s weakened, we learn soon enough that he’s not a good man. Momplaisir shows how Lucien’s wickedness and perversity allow him to exploit other Haitian immigrants, especially women. In this way, Momplaisir illuminates the darker side of immigrant life, in particular Haitian immigrant life, with parents separated from their children—by the parents’ own design—and people with expired green cards or visas who descend into the perilous underground economy or are otherwise forced to live in sketchy circumstances. There is also the ghastly legacy of colorism, in which light-skinned Haitians like Lucien are valued over those of darker hues. La Kay watches Lucien’s crimes for years, and even after it sets itself on fire, it still watches and waits.

Still, Momplaisir makes you feel an ember of sympathy for Lucien, whose sole refrain since childhood has been “I am nothing.” He’s nothing without his wife, his daughters, the women whom he uses, discards and then reels back in. He seems buffeted by love, an emotion whose demands he can’t understand or fulfill. Yet these women survive against terrible odds. 

In Momplaisir’s novel, cracks of light are always there to penetrate the dark.

Once in a while you come across a novel whose protagonist is so engaging that you find yourself thinking, Oh no! or Don’t do that! interspersed with sighs of relief and some heartfelt rejoicing when things go right for a change. Lily King’s Writers & Lovers is one of those novels.

Casey Kasem, née Camila Peabody, is a struggling writer trying (and failing) to make ends meet as a waitress, living in her landlord’s converted shed and walking his dog in the morning to get a break on the rent. She lacks health insurance. She’s $70K in debt, and though she has many supportive friends, her love life is a shambles. On top of this, her beloved mother recently died, suddenly and prematurely, and no one seems to know why. Casey’s father, a pervert who’s bitter over Casey’s failure to become a golf pro, is a waste of space.

King is one of those rare writers who can entwine sadness, hilarity and burning fury in the briefest of moments. There’s a lot of this in her restaurant scenes, which are so finely observed that you may wonder if King ever worked in a sad little eatery once upon a time. Though some of Casey’s co-workers are funny and caring, others leave her quivering with rage. The moment when she finally quits (or is fired) will make you want to put on Johnny Paycheck’s “Take This Job and Shove It” and dance around the room.

Casey’s story, like so many stories in real life, is messy. She’s messy. But Lily King’s book isn’t. It’s a pleasure.

King’s other characters are just as well drawn, including Oscar, Casey’s somewhat older lover. He’s a successful writer, a widower, a Kevin Costner look-alike and father of two adorably rambunctious boys. Then there’s Casey’s other lover, Silas, who’s younger and unsettled. King doesn’t hesitate to bring up how financial insecurity impacts love; should Casey move in with Oscar and the boys just because she’s about to be evicted and can’t afford rent? Nor can Casey choose whether to write for love or money; she has to write for both reasons.

Though the year is young, this reviewer thinks the word for 2020 is going to be “messy.” Casey’s story, like so many stories in real life, is messy. She’s messy. But King’s book isn’t. It’s a pleasure.

“The mass of men lead lives of quiet desperation,” according to Thoreau. That’s if they’re lucky. What if, like the narrator of Tash Aw’s latest novel, the desperation is noisy and violent? When We, the Survivors opens, such desperation has caused Ah Hock to take another man’s life.

Ah Hock is a Chinese citizen of Malaysia, a country where everybody—every man, woman and child—is on the hustle, and everybody is fungible. When the workers at the fish farm where Ah Hock is foreman come down with cholera, he and everyone else assumes they can be replaced easily, cheaply and permanently. It matters not if the substitutes are refugees from Myanmar, Nepal, Indonesia, Bangladesh or Mars. Indeed, bosses seek out these refugees because they can be paid much less than native Malaysian workers. There’s no thought given to sick leave, health insurance or even how people come down with cholera in the 21st century in the first place. But the economy is booming, and the replacements all have jobs.

Ah Hock’s boss is out of town, and he knows he’ll be canned if he can’t find a work crew, even though no part of the emergency is his fault. If he’s fired, he’ll probably be thumped back down to the bottom of a brutal economic hierarchy. He is no longer very young, and his body can’t tolerate the grueling physical labor of his youth.

Told to two interlocutors, a shadowy “you” and an uptight scribbler named Su-Min who writes a novel based on Ah Hock’s adventures, We, the Survivors begins and ends after the homicide. In between, the narrative loops through different, crucial times in Ah Hock’s life. Through most of that time, he maintains a reluctant friendship with a scoundrel named Keong. At times a drug dealer, gangster and fixer, Keong is a creep, but a fascinating one. He knows how the corrupt, inhumane hyper-capitalism of Malaysia works, and he works it to his advantage. Ever on the brink of violence, Keong knows everybody who’s anybody. Sometimes he’s flush, sometimes not. But his dedication to his “little brother” Ah Hock is genuine, and when Ah Hock goes to Keong for help, the hustler of hustlers does his utmost. It’s not enough.

The author of The Harmony Silk Factory, Aw brings us a steamy, smelly, muddy, Hobbesian Malaysia most tourists avoid. If there’s a book that’s a masterpiece of the wages of the worship of Moloch, it’s We, the Survivors.