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Book Reviewed by:
Elisabeth Cook
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A stunning debut novel following the turbulent relationship of a Black, biracial teen and her ferocious Russian mother, struggling to survive in the California desert.
When sixteen-year-old Lara and her fiery mother, Yevgenia, find themselves homeless again, the misnamed Oasis Mobile Estates is all they can afford. In this new community, where residents are down on their luck but rich in humor and escape plans, Lara navigates what it means to be the Black, biracial daughter of a Russian mother and begins to wonder what a life beyond Yevgenia's orbit—insistence on reading only the right kind of books (Russian), having the right kind of relationships (casual, with lots of sex)—might look like.
Lara knows that something else lies beneath her mother's fierce, independent spirit, but Yevgenia doesn't believe in sharing, least of all with her daughter. When a brutal attack exposes the cracks in their relationship, Lara and Yevgenia are forced to confront the family legacy of violence and the strain of inherited trauma on the bonds of their love.
A Country You Can Leave is a dazzling, sharp-witted story, suffused with yearning, as Lara and Yevgenia attempt to forge their own identities and thrive in a hostile land. Compelling and empathetic, wry and intimate, Asale Angel-Ajani's unforgettable debut novel examines the beauty and dangers of womanhood in multiracial America.
1
There is no release from life's turmoil, so put your back into it.
In a gulch somewhere between the San Jacinto and Santa Anas, my mother, Yevgenia, slows the car at the sign welcoming us to the dubiously named Oasis Mobile Estates. She cuts the engine behind the property manager's battered truck and goes about the task of cleaning herself up. She pulls a rubber band out of her stiff, dyed-black hair. She scrunches it back to life. Tweezers in hand, she yanks the rearview mirror down to brutalize her already emaciated eyebrows. When she smell-checks her armpits, I know there is a man inside.
"Don't I get a vote?" I ask, watching Yevgenia resuscitate her breasts by scooping them up in her bra. Our drive from Nevada to California has been nonstop. For miles, nothing but hot dust, windswept trash, and nameless mountains closing in on our resentments.
My mother ignores me. Instead, she looks through the bug-splattered windshield, her eyes turned to the heaven she doesn't believe in. She ...
The novel's quirky mood suggests that it could be a fairly standard, humorous feel-good story that culminates in a reconciliation of differences between mother and daughter. But it's far sadder than that and better for it. A Country You Can Leave willingly adopts the structure of a coming-of-age story, full as it is of dramatic occurrences that serve as learning experiences, yet also skips lightly over this structure. It hits all of the expected beats with confidence, but with a muted quality, deftly filling the mold of a conventional novel more satisfyingly than many more conventional narratives do...continued
Full Review
(995 words)
(Reviewed by Elisabeth Cook).
Ann-Marie MacDonald, author of Fayne
A tour de force of character, and a captivating story to match. Vivid, tender and unflinching, I loved this journey. Julia Phillips, author of Disappearing Earth
Refined and raw, cosmopolitan and claustrophobic, A Country You Can Leave is a novel of contrasts, built around a mother and daughter who see themselves as nothing alike. Asale Angel-Ajani portrays the complexity of the whole world through this one core relationship. Her debut is as loving as it is demanding, as vulnerable as it is merciless, and its complications will break your heart. Sarah Jackson, author of A Bit Much
A Country You Can Leave is an enthralling and heartfelt novel. In this striking debut, Asale Angel-Ajani's phenomenal skills shine on every page. This book will leave you profoundly moved and feeling like you better understand the word loneliness. Tania James, author of The Tusk That Did the Damage
A Country You Can Leave shattered me with its pain and sweetness. At its heart are a mother and daughter like none I've read before, each striving for selfhood in a world that seems bent on crushing them. It's rare to encounter a debut so fearless and insightful and truly new, but here is Asale Angel-Ajani to show us what's possible in the landscape of American fiction. Xochitl Gonzalez, author of Olga Dies Dreaming
From page one, A Country You Can Leave is a riveting, exasperating, and deeply heartbreaking tale of mother-daughter strife and resilience. Asale Angel-Ajani is an explosive talent and her story of Afro-Cuban Lara coming of age in a ruthless headlock with her survivalist Russian mother, Yevgenia, will disintegrate your strong-held emotional walls, down to her very last act of resistance.
In A Country You Can Leave by Asale Angel-Ajani, teenage narrator Lara characterizes her mother Yevgenia's reading habits as something akin to a religious experience. She describes coming upon her at a time when she was utterly absorbed by Nikolai Gogol's Dead Souls: "...a book she had read before, only this time she was reading the Italian translation. Months later she read it again in Spanish. My mother reads for nostalgia. The same twenty or maybe twenty-five books year in and year out, in the original and in translation. Once I know this, I understand that what my mother seeks from books isn't what I seek. I want to be lifted up, carried away. She wants to be anchored. The exact opposite of what each of us wants from our real life."
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