How to Read the Air (Paperback)
Dinaw Mengestu (author)Published: 05/01/2012
A powerful and moving summer read that explores love, grief and the reality of the contemporary American immigrant experience
Jonas, fresh from a failed marriage, is desperate to make sense of the ties that have forged him. How can he dream of a future when he can't make sense of his past? He hits the road, tracing the route that his parents - young Ethiopians in search of an identity as an American couple - took thirty years earlier to Nashville, Tennessee.
In a stunning display of imagination he weaves together a history that takes him from the war-torn Ethiopia of his parents' youth to a brighter vision of his own life in contemporary America, a story - real or invented- that holds the possibility of reconciliation and redemption.
‘A story of exile and redemption, beautifully written’ The Times
Publisher: Vintage Publishing
ISBN: 9780099521037
Number of pages: 336
Weight: 234 g
Dimensions: 198 x 129 x 20 mm
MEDIA REVIEWS
A straight-forward, compassionate, keenly sensitive observer of real life - James Lasdun, Guardian
A story of exile and redemption, beautifully written - Kate Saunders, The Times
[Mengestu has] pulled off a narrative sleight of hand, weaving two - or is it three? - beautiful fictions, while reminding us subtly that the most seductive may be the least true - Los Angeles Times
How To Read the Air is deeply thought out, deliberate in its craftsmanship and in many parts beautifully written...remarkably talented - Miguel Syjuco, The Scotsman
Challenging - Peter Carty, Independent
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“An interesting perspective”
A gentle read giving an interesting slant on life in USA as viewed by Ethiopian immigrants.
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