Fabulous Fiction Firsts #564

Tue, 11/10/2015 - 10:50pm by muffy

Gold Fame Citrus * * *, the debut novel by UM Assistant Professor Claire Vaye Watkins is truly worth the wait. (No doubt, my eager anticipation is due in part, to the New York Times book review by Emily St. John Mandel).

Set in the near future, when extreme drought and water shortage laid waste to much of the western states, Los Angeles is not longer the land of gold, fame and citrus. With mass exodus to lusher regions, only a few hardy souls remain. Luz, a 25-year old former model and her boyfriend Ray, whose survival skills are keeping them alive, are holed up in the abandoned mansion of a Hollywood starlet. But when they take in a very strange little girl, they realize that it's time to seek a safer place.

Danger lurks as they head east - sinkholes, patrolling authorities, bandits and the brutal sun. Seeking refuge in a rumored desert commune, Luz comes under the sway of the charismatic leader of an outpost in the desert, threatening the bond of their make-shift family.

"Immensely moving, profoundly disquieting, and mind-blowingly original, Watkins’s novel explores the myths we believe about others and tell about ourselves, the double-edged power of our most cherished relationships, and the shape of hope in a precarious future that may be our own."

Readers might want to check out Claire Vaye Watkins’s multiple-awards winning story collection, Battleborn, among them, the National Book Foundation “5 Under 35”, and the Story Prize.

This debut novel would likely remind readers of Swamplandia! by Karen Russell; Station Eleven by Emily St. John Mandel; and The Road by Cormac McCarthy.

* * * = 3 starred reviews