Book Review of Dogs of Summer by Andrea Abreu
Name of Book: Dogs of SummerAuthor: Andrea Abreu (translated by Julia Sanches)
ISBN: 978-1-6626-0245-0
Publisher: Astra House
Type of book: Canary Islands, Spanish, low working class, friendship, LGBtQI, sapphic attraction, summer of 2001, fog, volcano, boredom
Year it was published: 2020 (2022)
Summary:
My Brilliant Friend meets Blue is the Warmest Color in this lyrical debut novel set in a working-class neighborhood of the Canary Islands—a story about two girls coming of age in the early aughts and a friendship that simmers into erotic desire over the course of one hot summer.
High near the volcano of northern Tenerife, an endless ceiling of cloud cover traps the working class in an abject, oppressive heat. Far away from the island’s posh resorts, two girls dream of hitching a ride down to the beach and escaping their horizonless town.
It’s summer, 2005, and our ten-year-old narrator is consumed by thoughts of her best friend Isora. Isora is rude and bossy, but she’s also vivacious and brave; grownups prefer her, and boys do, too. That's why sometimes she gets jealous of Isora, who already has hair on her vagina and soft, round breasts. But she's definitely not jealous that Isora’s mother is dead, nor that Isora's fat, foul-mouthed grandmother has her on a diet, so that she is constantly sticking her fingers down her throat. Besides, she would do anything for Isora: gorge herself on cakes when her friend wants to watch, follow her to the bathroom when she takes a shit, log into chat rooms to swap dirty instant messages with strangers. But increasingly, our narrator finds it hard to keep up with Isora, who seems to be growing up at full tilt without her—and as her submissiveness veers into a painful sexual awakening, desire grows indistinguishable from intimate violence.
Braiding prose poetry with bachata lyrics and the gritty humor of Canary dialect, Dogs of Summer is a story of exquisite yearning, a brutal picture of girlhood and a love song written for the vital community it portrays.
Main characters would be Isora as well as Shit (the nickname Isora gave our narrator.) Isora is best described as fearless, mischievous, but has a complex relationship with her grandmother and food as well as herself. Isora seems to take things for granted and thinks little of the future. The narrator, Shit, has a complicated relationship with Isora, one minute worshipping her the other minute hating her. The narrator comes from a slightly stable relationship but at the same time she seems to have a parasocial or parasitic relationship with Isora, often loving her other times detesting her. The other characters would be Isora's grandmother who owns a minimarket and who teaches her granddaughter about diet and gives her bad tools for relationship with food. There are quite a few other characters such as Juanito aka Juanita Banana who is a boy but who loves playing Barbies with Isora and Shit and so forth.
Theme:
What makes us us?
Plot:
The story is in first person narrative from, well Shit's point of view (I didn't really learn her real name at all,) and takes place during the summer of possibly in 2001 (later on there is reference to 9/11) what is definitely interesting is kind of a link between this novel and SUMMER OF RECKONING, the previous novel I read. Shit has parasitic (or in modern terms a parasocial relationship) with Isora. The novel describes their activities and times they spend together and incorporates the music, Barbie games as well as telenovelas that make up their summer. I would definitely describe this as a psychological and exploratory novel rather than action filled.
Author Information:
(From goodreads)
N/A
Opinion:
While reading the novel, my mind kept comparing it as the dirty and grittier version of SUMMER SISTERS by Judy Blume. I hadn't really experienced such close female relationship so I can't quite comment on whether or not its accurate, but I can admit that the tale is compulsive and addictive because it shows the readers the things that might be ignored. In the story there is a lot of what one might call fat-shaming as well as attention to sexuality and body fluids. There is also no quotation marks. The tale is best described as episodical, taking place outside of the wealthy area in Canary Islands and there the readers meet a lot of memorable and rough people. If you are looking for a novel that compelling and doesn't sanitize life as SUMMER SISTERS by Judy Blume does, then DOGS OF SUMMER should definitely be on top of the list.
This was given for review
4 out of 5
(0: Stay away unless a masochist 1: Good for insomnia 2: Horrible but readable; 3: Readable and quickly forgettable, 4: Good, enjoyable 5: Buy it, keep it and never let it go.)
Opinion:
While reading the novel, my mind kept comparing it as the dirty and grittier version of SUMMER SISTERS by Judy Blume. I hadn't really experienced such close female relationship so I can't quite comment on whether or not its accurate, but I can admit that the tale is compulsive and addictive because it shows the readers the things that might be ignored. In the story there is a lot of what one might call fat-shaming as well as attention to sexuality and body fluids. There is also no quotation marks. The tale is best described as episodical, taking place outside of the wealthy area in Canary Islands and there the readers meet a lot of memorable and rough people. If you are looking for a novel that compelling and doesn't sanitize life as SUMMER SISTERS by Judy Blume does, then DOGS OF SUMMER should definitely be on top of the list.
This was given for review
4 out of 5
(0: Stay away unless a masochist 1: Good for insomnia 2: Horrible but readable; 3: Readable and quickly forgettable, 4: Good, enjoyable 5: Buy it, keep it and never let it go.)
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