How Not To Drown In A Glass OF Water by Angie Cruz

I read in a review that the Spanish word desahogar translates “to un-drown” and that is roughly the equivalent of venting, or getting it of your chest, which is what Cara Romero does when an interviewer with an employment assistance program in New York asks her to say something about herself. The story, told in Cara’s frank, unfiltered, and sometimes hilarious voice, quickly expands like the bellows of an accordion to release chords of friendship, community and, occasionally, lust, that provides a counter balance to the financial stresses, discrimination and personal divisions faced by Cara, her family and friends in their rapidly gentrifying Washington Heights neighborhood. The structure of the novel is built around 12 interview sessions designed to assess Cara’s job readiness and eligibility for continued unemployment benefits. She fills each meeting with stories of her life’s challenges, including her arrival in New York from the Dominican Republic 26 years earlier fleeing her murderous husband, her struggle to support her son and siblings, and the sudden loss of her steady factory job to an overseas facility. She punctuates her anecdotes with clear-eyed observations about contradictions and injustices in the country where she has spent most of her adult life, even as she studies to become a U.S. citizen. She clearly tells us that the country she has adopted is not welcoming her with welcome arms, but she is staying anyway.